Numerical investigation of two-phase flow encountered in electrically enhanced oil recovery

Abstract

The study of two-phase immiscible flow in porous media using electrokinetics is important in different fields including the remediation of hydrocarbon contaminated soils and enhanced oil recovery. While electrokinetic technology has been traditionally used for treatment and decontamination of hydrocarbon polluted sites, electrically enhanced oil recovery (EEOR) is relatively new. Although a few laboratory and field experiments have investigated the potential promise of the EEOR method, further investigation is necessary to better understand the fundamentals and the importance of different parameters/processes that affect the oil production in this method. This study presents a numerical investigation of two-phase flow in EEOR method in an attempt to provide insight into the feasibility of, and the important parameters involved in this method. A sensitivity analysis is performed on important parameters involved in EEOR combined with water flooding. Most of the investigated reservoir and operational parameters were found to be significant and critical to the transport phenomena controlling the oil production. In addition, the results showed that the applied electrical gradient involved in EEOR combined with water flooding contributes to a small increase in oil production.