Bayesian Full-waveform Monitoring of CO2 Storage with Fluid-flow Priors via Generative Modeling

TL;DR

This paper introduces a Bayesian full-waveform monitoring framework that integrates reservoir flow physics with generative modeling to improve uncertainty quantification in subsurface CO2 storage monitoring, especially with sparse and noisy data.

Contribution

It develops a novel Bayesian inversion method using a VAE-based generative prior and HMC sampling, enhancing stability and accuracy over deterministic approaches.

Findings

Improves inversion stability with sparse, noisy data

Provides uncertainty estimates for CO2 plume evolution

Identifies measurement locations to reduce ambiguity

Abstract

Quantitative monitoring of subsurface changes is essential for ensuring the safety of geological CO2 sequestration. Full-waveform monitoring (FWM) can resolve these changes at high spatial resolution, but conventional deterministic inversion lacks uncertainty quantification and incorporates only limited prior information. Deterministic approaches can also yield unreliable results with sparse and noisy seismic data. To address these limitations, we develop a Bayesian FWM framework that combines reservoir flow physics with generative prior modeling. Prior CO2 saturation realizations are constructed by performing multiphase flow simulations on prior geological realizations. Seismic velocity is related to saturation through rock physics modeling. A variational autoencoder (VAE) trained on the priors maps high-dimensional CO2 saturation fields onto a low-dimensional, approximately Gaussian latent space, enabling efficient Bayesian inference while retaining the key geometrical structure of the CO2 plume. Hamiltonian Monte Carlo (HMC) is used to infer CO2 saturation changes from time-lapse seismic data and to quantify associated uncertainties. Numerical results show that this approach improves inversion stability and accuracy under extremely sparse and noisy acquisition, whereas deterministic methods become unreliable. Statistical seismic monitoring provides posterior uncertainty estimates that identify where additional measurements would most reduce ambiguity and mitigate errors arising from biased rock physics parameters. The framework combines reservoir physics, generative priors, and Bayesian inference to provide uncertainty quantification for time-lapse monitoring of CO2 storage and other subsurface processes.