Finger Thickening during Extra-Heavy Oil Waterflooding: Simulation and Interpretation Using Pore-Scale Modelling.

ABSTRACT: Although thermal methods have been popular and successfully applied in heavy oil recovery, they are often found to be uneconomic or impractical. Therefore, alternative production protocols are being actively pursued and interesting options include water injection and polymer flooding. Indeed, such techniques have been successfully tested in recent laboratory investigations, where X-ray scans performed on homogeneous rock slabs during water flooding experiments have shown evidence of an interesting new phenomenon-post-breakthrough, highly dendritic water fingers have been observed to thicken and coalesce, forming braided water channels that improve sweep efficiency. However, these experimental studies involve displacement mechanisms that are still poorly understood, and so the optimization

SUBMITTER: Regaieg M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5266317 | biostudies-literature | 2017

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature