Investigation on Flow Behaviour in Porous Media During Water Flooding and Following CO2 Flooding Using MRI

Abstract

This article addresses the use of MRI technique to follow the process of oil, water, supercritical CO2 multiphase flow in consolidated sandstone core plug at a typical reservoir temperature and pressure condition. 2D images at various times and quantitative saturation curves were obtained during all stages of the flooding process. The fronts and interfaces between displaced and displacing fluids were also dynamics monitored in situ during water and subsequent supercritical CO2 flooding process. The results showed that the process of CO2 flooding enhanced oil recovery more than 10% based on the previous water flooding. A method of predicting the relative permeability and capillary pressure curves was successfully extended and applied to CO2 flooding, the capillary pressure, the wetting and non-wetting phase relative permeability curves were simultaneously estimated from the capillary end saturation profiles, which were measured with MRI technique. These curves are important and required in various reservoir simulations for evaluating hydrocarbon recovery processes.