Pore-to-Reservoir Investigations for Strategic Energy Materials (PRISEM)

The PRISEM project works on the following questions:

• What are the microbial communities in the subsurface? How do these communities influence energy resource generation and storage? Are there opportunities to stimulate subsurface microbes to enhance energy resource production?
• How do energy fluids (e.g., methane, hydrogen, carbon dioxide) behave under confinement in subsurface pores? How does this behavior enhance or restrict fluid movement and recovery? What geochemical aspects are important to understand these behaviors?
• Are there critical mineral (CM) resources associated with coal mine drainages? What are the masses and locations associated with potential enrichments? What are the radiological hazards associated with CMs contained within energy wastes? What are mechanisms responsible for CM enrichment in energy wastes?

Research on these objectives informs Congress, State and Federal agencies, private organizations, and the public on the U.S. energy endowment.

The PRISEM project is organized into three research tasks and supports four research laboratories:

Research tasks:

• Subsurface geomicrobiology of energy materials – Task leads Matthew Varonka and Elliott Barnhart
• Pore-scale geochemistry of energy materials – Task leads Aaron Jubb and Rebecca Stokes
• Energy co-products as a resource – Task leads Bonnie McDevitt and Elizabeth Tomaszewski

Supported laboratories:

• Eastern Energy and Environmental Laboratory (EEEL)
• Raman Spectroscopy Laboratory (RSL)
• Naturally Occurring Radioactive Material Laboratory (NORM)
• Pore Observation and Research Laboratory (PORE)