Seismic dynamic monitoring in CO_2 flooding based on characterization of frequency-dependent velocity factor

The phase velocity of seismic waves varies with the propagation frequency, and thus frequency-dependent phenomena appear when CO2 gas is injected into a reservoir. By dynamically considering these phenomena with reservoir conditions it is thus feasible to extract the frequency-dependent velocity factor with the aim of monitoring changes in the reservoir both before and after CO2 injection. In the paper, we derive a quantitative expression for the frequency-dependent factor based on the Robinson seismic convolution model. In addition, an inversion equation with a frequency-dependent velocity factor is constructed, and a procedure is implemented using the following four processing steps： decomposition of the spectrum by generalized S transform, wavelet extraction of cross-well seismic traces, spectrum equalization processing, and an extraction method for frequency-dependent velocity factor based on the damped least-square algorithm. An attenuation layered model is then established based on changes in the Q value of the viscoelastic medium, and spectra of migration profiles from forward modeling are obtained and analyzed. Frequency-dependent factors are extracted and compared, and the effectiveness of the method is then verified using a synthetic data. The frequency-dependent velocity factor is finally applied to target processing and oil displacement monitoring based on real seismic data obtained before and after CO2 injection in the G89 well block within Shengli oilfield. Profiles and slices of the frequency-dependent factor determine its ability to indicate differences in CO2 flooding, and the predicting results are highly consistent with those of practical investigations within the well block.

Profile improvement during CO_2 flooding in ultra-low permeability reservoirs

Gas flooding such as CO2 flooding may be effectively applied to ultra-low permeability reservoirs, but gas channeling is inevitable due to low viscosity and high mobility of gas and formation heterogeneity. In order to mitigate or prevent gas channeling, ethylenediamine is chosen for permeability profile control. The reaction mechanism of ethylenediamine with CO2, injection performance, swept volume, and enhanced oil recovery were systematically evaluated. The reaction product of ethylenediamine and CO2 was a white solid or a light yellow viscous liquid, which would mitigate or prevent gas channeling. Also, ethylenediamine could be easily injected into ultra-low permeability cores at high temperature with protective ethanol slugs. The core was swept by injection of 0.3 PV ethylenediamine. Oil displacement tests performed on heterogeneous models with closed fractures, oil recovery was significantly enhanced with injection of ethylenediamine. Experimental results showed that using ethylenediamine to plug high permeability layers would provide a new research idea for the gas injection in fractured, heterogeneous and ultra-low permeability reservoirs. This technology has the potential to be widely applied in oilfields.

Effect of stress sensitivity on displacement efficiency in CO_2 flooding for fractured low permeability reservoirs

Carbon dioxide flooding is an effective means of enhanced oil recovery for low permeability reservoirs. If fractures are present in the reservoir, CO2 may flow along the fractures, resulting in low gas displacement efficiency. Reservoir pore pressure will fluctuate to some extent during a CO2 flood, causing a change in effective confining pressure. The result is rock deformation and a reduction in permeability with the reduction in fracture permeability, causing increased flow resistance in the fracture space. Simultaneously, gas cross flowing along the fractures is partially restrained. In this work, the effect of stress changes on permeability was studied through a series of flow experiments. The change in the flowrate distribution in a matrix block and contained fracture with an increase in effective pressure were analyzed. The results lead to an implicit comparison which shows that permeability of fractured core decreases sharply with an increase in effective confining pressure. The fracture flowrate ratio declines and the matrix flowrate ratio increases. Fracture flow will partially divert to the matrix block with the increase in effective confining pressure, improving gas displacement efficiency.

CO_2-triggered gelation for mobility control and channeling blocking during CO_2 flooding processes

CO2 flooding is regarded as an important method for enhanced oil recovery （EOR） and greenhouse gas control. However, the heterogeneity prevalently dis- tributed in reservoirs inhibits the performance of this technology. The sweep efficiency can be significantly reduced especially in the presence of ＂thief zones＂. Hence, gas channeling blocking and mobility control are important technical issues for the success of CO2 injection. Normally, crosslinked gels have the potential to block gas channels, but the gelation time control poses challenges to this method. In this study, a new method for selectively blocking CO2 channeling is proposed, which is based on a type of CO2-sensitive gel system （modified polyacry- lamide-methenamine-resorcinol gel system） to form gel in situ. A CO2-sensitive gel system is when gelation or solidification will be triggered by CO2 in the reservoir to block gas channels. The CO2-sensitivity of the gel system was demonstrated in parallel bottle tests of gel in N2 and CO2 atmospheres. Sand pack flow experiments were con- ducted to investigate the shutoff capacity of the gel system under different conditions. The injectivity of the gel system was studied via viscosity measurements. The results indi- cate that this gel system was sensitive to CO2 and had good performance of channeling blocking in porous media. Advantageous viscosity-temperature characteristics were achieved in this work. The effectiveness for EOR in heterogeneous formations based on this gel system was demonstrated using displacement tests conducted in double sand packs. The experimental results can provide guideli- nes for the deployment of theCO2-sensitive gel system for field applications.

Modeling CO_2 miscible flooding for enhanced oil recovery

The injection of fuel-generated CO2 into oil reservoirs will lead to two benefits in both enhanced oil recovery （EOR） and the reduction in atmospheric emission of CO2. To get an insight into CO2 miscible flooding performance in oil reservoirs, a multi-compositional non-isothermal CO2 miscible flooding mathematical model is developed. The convection and diffusion of CO2-hydrocarbon mixtures in multiphase fluids in reservoirs, mass transfer between CO2 and crude, and formation damages caused by asphaltene precipitation are fully considered in the model. The governing equations are discretized in space using the integral finite difference method. The Newton-Raphson iterative technique was used to solve the nonlinear equation systems of mass and energy conservation. A numerical simulator, in which regular grids and irregular grids are optional, was developed for predicting CO2 miscible flooding processes. Two examples of one-dimensional （1D） regular and three-dimensional （3D） rectangle and polygonal grids are designed to demonstrate the functions of the simulator. Experimental data validate the developed simulator by comparison with 1D simulation results. The applications of the simulator indicate that it is feasible for predicting CO2 flooding in oil reservoirs for EOR.

Integrated Techniques of Underground CO_2 Storage and Flooding Put into Commercial Application in the Jilin Oilfield, China

Global warming touches everybody＇s nerve, and direct reason for sharp increasing of CO2 in the atmosphere results mainly from the use of fossil fuel in power generation and other industries. How can humans return this ＂devil＂ to underground, and keep a peaceful environment for human？ Scientists from all over the world have been exploring them.

Experimental study on asphaltene precipitation induced by CO_2 flooding

The effects of CO2 pressure,temperature and concentration on asphaltene precipitation induced by CO2 were studied using a high-pressure vessel,interfacial tensiometer,Fourier transform infrared （FTIR） and drill core displacement experimental apparatus.The results indicated that the content of asphaltene in crude oil decreased,and the interfacial tension between a model oil and distilled water increased,with an increase of CO2 pressure,decrease of temperature and increase of molar ratio of CO2 to crude oil when CO2 contacted crude oil in the high pressure vessel.The content of asphaltene in sweepout oil and the permeability of test cores both also decreased with an increase of CO2 flooding pressure.The main reason for changes in content of asphaltene in crude oil,in interfacial tension between model oil and distilled water and in the permeability of the test core is the precipitation of asphaltene which is an interfacially active substance in crude oil.Precipitation of asphaltene also blocks pores in the drill core which decreases the permeability.

Visualization of CO_2 and oil immiscible and miscible flow processes in porous media using NMR micro-imaging

CO2 flooding is considered not only one of the most effective enhanced oil recovery （EOR） methods, but also an important alternative for geological CO2 storage. In this paper, the visualization of CO2 flooding was studied using a 400 MHz NMR micro-imaging system. For gaseous CO2 immiscible displacement, it was found that CO2 channeling or fingering occurred due to the difference of fluid viscosity and density. Thus, the sweep efficiency was small and the final residual oil saturation was 53.1%. For supercritical CO2 miscible displacement, the results showed that piston-like displacement occurred, viscous fingering and the gravity override caused by the low viscosity and density of the gas was effectively restrained, and the velocity of CO2 front was uniform. The sweep efficiency was so high that the final residual oil saturation was 33.9%, which indicated CO2 miscible displacement could enhance oil recovery more than CO2 immiscible displacement. In addition, the average velocity of CO2 front was evaluated through analyzing the oil saturation profile. A special core analysis method has been applied to in-situ oil saturation data to directly evaluate the local Darcy phase velocities and capillary dispersion rate.

A New Material Balance Equation Model for Analyzing Dynamic Performance of C_2 Flooding

Implementing a CO2 flooding scheme successfully requires the capacity to get accurate information of reservoir dynamic performance and fluids injected. Despite some numerical simulation studies, the complicated drive mechanisms and actual reservoir performance have not been fully understood. There is a strong need to develop models from different perspectives to complement current simulators and provide valuable insights into the reservoir performance during CO2 flooding. The aim of this study is to develop a model by using an improved material balance equation （MBE） to analyze quickly the performance of CO2 flooding. After matching the historical field data the proposed model can be used to evaluate, monitor and predict the overall reservoir dynamic performance during CO2 flooding. In order to account accurately for the complex displacement process involving compositional effect and multiphase flow, the PVT properties and flowability of reservoir fluids are incorporated in the model. This study investigates the effects of a number of factors, such as reservoir pressure, the amount of CO2 injected, the CO2 partition ratios in reservoir fluids, the possibility of the existence of a free CO2 gas cap, the proportion of reservoir fluids contacted with CO2, the starting time of CO2 flooding, oil swelling, and oil flowability improvement by mixing with CO2. The model was used to analyze the CO2 flooding project in Weyburn oil field, Saskatchewan, Canada. This study shows that the proposed model is an effective complementary tool to analyze and monitor the overall reservoir performance during CO2 flooding.

An improved correlation to determine minimum miscibility pressure of CO2–oil system

An accurate and reliable estimation of minimum miscibility pressure(MMP) of CO2-oil system is a critical task for the design and implementation of CO2 miscible displacement process.In this study,an improved CO2-oil MMP correlation was developed to predict the MMP values for both pure and impure CO2 injection cases based on ten influential factors,i.e.reservoir temperature(TR),molecular weight of C7+oil components(MWC7+),mole fraction of volatile oil components(xvol),mole fraction of C2-C4 oil components(xC2-C4),mole fraction of C5-C6 oil components(xCs-5-C6),and the gas stream mole fractions of CO2(yCO2),H2S(yH2S),C1(yC1),hydrocarbons(yHC)and N2(yN2).The accuracy of the improved correlation was evaluated against experimental data reported in literature concurrently with those estimated by several renowned correlations.It was found that the improved correlation provided higher prediction accuracy and consistency with literature experimental data than other literature correlations.In addition,the predictive capability of the improved correlation was further validated by predicting an experimentally measured CO2-Oil MMP data,and it showed an accurate result with the absolute deviation of 4.15%.Besides,the differential analysis of the improved correlation was analyzed to estimate the impact of parameters uncertainty in the original MMP data on the calculated results.Also,sensitivity analysis was performed to analyze the influence of each parameter on MMP qualitatively and quantitatively.The results revealed that the increase of xC2-C4,xC5-C6 and yH2 S lead to the decrease of MMP,while the increase of TR,MWC7+,xvol,yCO2,YC1,yHC and yN2 tend to increase the MMP.Overall,the relevance of each parameter with MMP follows the order of TR> xC5-C6> MWC7+> xvol> yH2 S> yHC> yCO2>yC1>yN2>xC2-C4.

A STREAMLINE-BASED PREDICTIVE MODEL FOR ENHANCED-OIL-RECOVERY POTENTIALITY

A pseudo-three-dimensional model of potentiality prediction is proposed for enhanced oil recovery, based on the streamline method described in this article. The potential distribution of the flow through a porous medium under a complicated boundary condition is solved with the boundary element method. Furthermore, the method for tracing streamlines between injection wells and producing wells is presented. Based on the results, a numerical solution can be obtained by solving the seepage problem of the stream-tube with consideration of different methods of Enhanced Oil Recovery（EOR）. The advantage of the method given in this article is that it can obtain dynamic calculation with different well patterns of any shape by easily considering different physicochemical phenomena having less calculation time and good stability. Based on the uniform theory basis-streamline method, different models, including CO2 miscible flooding, polymer flooding, alkaline/surfactant/polymer flooding and microbial flooding, are established in this article.