Sustainable Development of Deep Unconventional Energy and Geological CO₂ Storage

With the continued implementation of the carbon peaking and carbon neutrality strategy, deep unconventional energy resources (including shale gas, coalbed methane, tight oil and gas, and natural gas hydrates) have become critical alternative resources for global energy infrastructure transition and security. Meanwhile, geological CO₂ storage has emerged as a core technical pathway for large-scale carbon emission reduction, demonstrating broad applicability to deep geological formations such as saline aquifers, depleted oil and gas reservoirs, and unmineable coal seams. Deep unconventional energy development and geological CO₂ storage share many common geological and environmental challenges associated with deep subsurface environments, including high in-situ stress, high formation pressure, strong reservoir heterogeneity, and coupled multiphysics, multiphase and multicomponent interactions. Key technical challenges remain, including minimizing environmental impacts from reservoir stimulation, ensuring the long-term integrity and containment of storage complexes, mitigating and controlling leakage risks, and improving monitoring, verification and evaluation systems. Recent advances in reservoir geology, rock mechanics, fluid flow in porous media, environmental geochemistry, intelligent sensing and artificial intelligence have provided a new theoretical foundation and technical tools for understanding and designing for multi-scale processes in deep reservoirs, optimizing energy development and storage operations, and improving full-life-cycle safety and performance.

 This Special Issue on “Sustainable Development of Deep Unconventional Energy and Geological CO₂ Storage” aims to bring together the latest research advances in fundamental science, key technologies, equipment R&D, and engineering demonstrations, thereby promoting interdisciplinary innovation and supporting global carbon neutrality goals and the sustainable utilization of deep Earth resources. Specifically, it focuses on deep geological systems—including deep shale oil and gas, coalbed methane, tight sandstone gas, natural gas hydrates, deep saline aquifers, depleted oil and gas reservoirs, and deep unmineable coal seams—and encompasses the full technology chain from reservoir characterization and evaluation, sustainable resource development, carbon storage, safety monitoring, and risk management to field-scale engineering demonstration. We welcome original research articles on fundamental theory, laboratory experiments, numerical simulation, field testing, technology and equipment development, and engineering demonstrations, as well as comprehensive reviews with systematic syntheses and forward-looking prospects. Interdisciplinary studies, multiphysics and multiphase coupling mechanisms, integrated physics-informed and data-driven approaches, intelligent monitoring, validation and risk assessment technologies, full-life-cycle management and control, and research validated through field-scale engineering projects are particularly encouraged.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

1. Fundamental Theoretical Developments in the Occurrence of Fluid Flow in Deep Unconventional Energy Resources

2. Reservoir Feasibility Assessment, Storage Mechanisms, and Long-Term Performance of Geological CO₂ Storage

3. Hydro-Mechanical-Chemical Processes and Coupled Multiphysics, Multiphase and Multicomponent Modelling of Deep Reservoirs

4. Theories and Technologies of CO₂-Enhanced Oil/Gas Recovery Coupled with Geological Storage (CCUS-EOR/EGR)

5. Intelligent Monitoring of Reservoirs and Storage Complexes, Leakage Risk Identification, and Environmental Impact Assessment

6. Engineering Practices, Environmental Management, and Standards and Regulatory Frameworks for Deep Unconventional Energy Development and CO₂ Storage

Guest Editor:

• Bangbiao Wu, Associate Professor, Tianjin University
• Tianran Ma, Associate Professor, China University of Mining and Technology
• Wenzhuo Cao, Assistant Professor, Utrecht University
• Bing Li, Assistant Professor, Western University

Submission Guidelines:

Manuscripts should be submitted online 

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process.

No Article Process Cost (APC) is required for articles.

Please contact the Guest Editors or DRE editorial office (deepre@mail.neu.edu.cn) for any question or query on this SI.

Submission Deadline: March 31, 2027