Impact of regional groundwater flow on geological temperature field with energy abstraction from the aquifer

A 3-D numerical model which couples a groundwater flow model with the heat transfer was used to analyze changes in the geological temperature field during and after energy mining for various regional groundwater flow scenarios. The simulation results show that the temperature field changes are closely related with both the regional groundwater flow velocities and the relationship between the well pair locations and the natural groundwater flow. Higher regional groundwater velocities more quickly restore the temperature of the pumping well. For the same natural groundwater flow velocity, the temperature changes at the pumping well are smaller if the regional groundwater flows parallel to the well pair rather than perpendicular to the well pair.