Nonlinear flow in low permeability reservoirs: Modelling and experimental verification

Abstract

The low-permeability reservoirs are of heavy heterogeneity, low permeability, fine oil-water passages, strong resistance during flow, and the significant interaction between solid and liquid interfaces causes the flow of fluid in reservoir deviating from the Darcy’s law. There is no agreement on the interaction between the various factors in seepage process and the influence of seepage law. The boundary layer exists when liquid flow in micro-tubes and nano-tubes, and the boundary layer decreases with the increase of driving force, and the maximum value of boundary layer ratio is equal to 1. Based on the capillary boundal model and the boundary layer theory, a new exponential seepage model for low permeability reservoirs was proposed. Some experiments of water flow with different pressure gradient were carried out in low permeability cores with permeability of 4 to 8 milidarcy in natural rock cores from an oilfield in China, and the nonlinear model is of good agreement with the single-phase water flooding experiments of these cores. The results demonstrate that the physical meaning of each parameter of the new model is clear and it can be applied to describe the nonlinear characteristics of low permeability reservoirs. The large driving force can overcome disadvantages in the developments of low permeability reservoirs.

Cited as: Song, F., Bo, L., Zhang, S., Sun, Y. Nonlinear flow in low permeability reservoirs: Modelling and experimental verification. Advances in Geo-Energy Research, 2019, 3(1): 76-81, doi: 10.26804/ager.2019.01.06

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