A Simplified Capillary Bundle Model for CO2-Alternating-Water Injection Using an Equivalent Resistance Method

CO2-alternating-water injection is an effective way of enhancing recovery for low-permeability oil reservoirs. The injection process is one of the essential issues that are facing severe challenges because of the low permeability and poor pore space connectivity. Previous researchers mentioned that water injection ability could be decreased by around 20% after the CO2-flooding; hence, it is necessary to quantify the water injectivity variation during an alternated injection process. In this paper, a CO2 convection-diffusion model is established based on the seepage law of CO2 and dissipation effect. The relationship between the width of miscible flooding and injection time is defined. Besides, an equivalent resistance method is introduced for developing a capillary bundle model for featuring an unequal diameter for CO2 water vapor alternate flooding. CO2-oil and CO2-water interactions are analyzed using the new model. The effects of oil viscosity, pore throat ratio, CO2 slug size, and equivalent permeability of the capillary bundle on water injection are analyzed. The result indicates that water injection ability increases with the rise of CO2 slug size and equivalent permeability of the capillary bundle and decreases with the increase of viscosity and pore throat ratio.

A DISCUSSION ON FRACTAL MODELS FOR TRANSPORT PHYSICS OF POROUS MEDIA

Fractal model provides an alternative and useful means for studying the transport phenomenon in porous media and analyzing the macroscopic transport properties of porous media, as fractal geometry can successfully characterize disordered and heterogeneous geometrical microstructures of porous media on multi scales. Recently, fractal models on porous media have attracted increasing interests from many different disciplines. In this mini-review paper, a review on fractal models for number-size distribution in porous media is made, and a unified fractal model to characterize pore and particle size distributions is proposed according to the statistical fractal property of the complex microstructure in porous media. Using the fractal scaling laws for pore and fracture size distributions, a fractal capillary bundle model and a fractal tree-like network model are presented and summarized for homogenous and fractured porous media, respectively. And the applications of the fractal capillary bundle model and fractal tree-like network model for analysis of transport physics in porous media are also reviewed.