Modelling the influence of interaction between injection and formation brine salinities on in-situ microbial enhanced oil recovery processes by coupling of multiple-ion exchange transport model with multiphase fluid flow and multi-species reactive transport models

Abstract

Interaction between injection water (IW) and formation water (FW) salinities during microbial flooding critically influences the dynamics of in-situ Microbial Enhanced Oil Recovery (MEOR) processes. However, the lack in understanding of the influence of salinity interactions on MEOR processes had led to unreliable prediction of MEOR performance, and non-development of efficient strategies to improve the MEOR performance. Hence, analysing the influence of salinity interactions on MEOR processes would make the prediction of MEOR processes more realistic, and thereby, it could assist in development of suitable strategies to enhance the oil recovery. Thus, in the present study, a novel mathematical model has been developed by coupling the Multiple Ion (Na, Ca, Mg, Cl, SO4) Exchange (MIE) transport model with the MEOR model, and it has been solved numerically by finite volume technique. The MIE transport model simulates the resultant spatial and temporal salinity distribution within the reservoir due to the mixing of IW and FW salinities during microbial flooding. The MEOR model simulates the coupled multiphase fluid (water-oil) flow and multispecies (microbes-nutrients) reactive transport processes within the reservoir, and finally predicts the oil recovery due to microbial flooding. Subsequently, the influence of IW and FW at different salinities on MEOR processes has been investigated. The present numerical results were validated with the experimental and analytical results. The results clearly suggest that the in-situ FW salinity was completely altered to the externally injected IW salinity, and this IW salinity dictates the entire MEOR processes as against the conventionally assumed FW salinity. Further, it is revealed that lowering the IW salinity from 0.5M to 0.1M had recovered 4.5%–14% of Original Oil in Place (OOIP) higher than that of conventionally used IW (sea water) for microbial flooding. Moreover, the MEOR performance could be enhanced significantly in reservoirs with any initial FW salinity by adopting IW salinity closer to the salinity condition at which the microbial growth and biosurfactant production is maximum. Finally, the present work assists in the selection of suitable reservoir, microbes, and IW salinity for attaining maximum oil recovery by microbial flooding. Thus, the present work helps to enhance the performance of MEOR technique.