Elevation Grid for top Columbia River Basalt (CRBG) in the Portland Basin used in DDU Feasibility Study

The Portland Basin is a prime location to assess the feasibility of DDU-TES because natural geologic conditions provide thermal and hydraulic separation from overlying aquifers that would otherwise sweep away stored heat. Under the Portland Basin, the lower Columbia River Basalt Group (CRBG) aquifers contain brackish water (1,000-10,000 mg/L TDS), indicating low groundwater flow rates and poor connection with the overlying regional aquifer. Further, CRBG lavas tend to have comparatively low thermal conductivity, indicating that the 400-1,000 ft thick CRBG may be an effective thermal barrier to the overlying aquifer. A temporally and spatially limited previous study of a Portland Basin CRBG aquifer demonstrated that the injection of waste heat resulted in an increase in temperature by more than a factor of two, indicating a high potential for storing heat.

This data submission includes ASCII grid surfaces for the Portland and Tualatin Basins including a DEM of modern topography, the top of Columbia River Basalt (CRB), the base of CRB, and basement. It also includes three isochore (thickness) maps between these intervals. In addition, there is an ArcGIS attribute table for associated data points, a map of data types used to constrain the top of CRB, and cross-sections, all made using IHS Kingdom Suite, Petrosys PRO, ESRI ArcGIS, and Adobe Illustrator software.