Experiment on the Gas Permeability and Gas–Water Relative Permeability in High-Rank Coal with a Self-Developed Device

Abstract

Water saturation, displacement pressure, and gas type are essential factors affecting the seepage characteristic of fluid in coal due to the swelling induced by gas adsorption. However, the understanding of the seepage behavior of water, CH4, and CO2 in coal seams is still poor owing to the lack of research. In this work, a series of gas permeability and gas–water relative permeability experiments were conducted by our self-developed device. The results can be summarized as follows: (1) with the increase in water saturation, the gas permeability decreased rapidly at first and then reduced sharply again after a period of slow decline; (2) the two-phase flow span showed no significant difference for He–water and CH4–water systems under different displacement pressures, but it increased for CO2-water system. The different behaviors of the two-phase flow span suggested that the effect of displacement pressure on relative permeability properties is dependent on the gas type. (3) The CO2–water relative permeability showed a sizeable two-phase flow span compared to the He–water or CH4–water system under the same displacement pressure, and the gas relative permeability decreased obviously in the following sequence: He > CH4 > CO2. The concept of relative permeability surface was proposed based on the experimental results. A parametric interpolation method was applied to determine the relative permeability surface, which could be used to accurately describe the flow characteristics of fluids in a mixed gas–water system.