CO2-prepad injection EOR simulation and sensitivity analysis considering miscibility and geomechanics in tight oil reservoirs

Abstract

Injecting CO2 pre-pad into tight reservoirs before hydraulic fracturing is a promising way to improve the productivity of single well. In this method, CO2 should be injected into the formation at a high rate. Also the miscibility of CO2 and oil with the changes of intricate geomechanics during this process are complex. Meanwhile, the geological and operating parameters have a dramatic influence to oil production and is lack of systematic research. In this study, a fluid model of crude oil was established to evaluate the impact of CO2 on oil volume and viscosity. Then, a compositional numerical model coupled miscibility and geomechanics were set up to analyze enhanced oil recovery (EOR) potential under different miscible degree with in-situ stress field. Ultimately, in accordance with multiple nonlinear regression production forecast models, Sobol, FAST (Fourier Amplitude Sensitivity Test), and DGSM (derivation-based Global Sensitivity Measure) methods were utilized to study the main factors affecting cumulative production. The results shown that CO2 almost has the same effect on the volume of these tight oil and has the most significant effect on the viscosity of crude oil we studied by comparing. The production of miscible flooding is 38.2% and 16.4% higher than that of immiscible and near-miscible flooding, respectively. The formation were compacted during production especially in the early stage, hence the production of the model with geomechanics was 23.3% less than the model of non-geomechanics. The first-order sensitivity indexes of bottom-hole flow pressure, reservoir thickness and fracture conductivity are about 0.808, 0.176 and 0.004 respectively obtained by Sobol method, consistent with two other methods. This result shows that bottom-hole flow pressure, reservoir thickness and fracture conductivity are the most important factors affecting production, and bottom-hole flow pressure has the most significant impact on production. This work investigates how miscibility and geomechanics effect on production as well as clarified the factors affecting production for CO2 pre-pad injection, providing vital insights into operating in tight reservoirs for oil field.