Numerical study of CO2-enhanced coalbed methane recovery

Abstract

Although CO2-enhanced coalbed methane (CO2-ECBM) recovery has been comprehensively investigated, fewer scholars have taken the effect of temperature into account, which brought a large deviation for the study of the influence of CO2-ECBM. In this work, a hydraulic-mechanical-thermal coupled model of CO2-ECBM is established, it combines binary gases (CO2 and CH4) infiltration and diffusion, where non-isothermal adsorption is also considered. The effect of injection pressure and reservoir initial temperature on CO2-ECBM was simulated by the finite element simulation software COMSOL Multiphysics, results show that: the injection of CO2 into coalbed has a good effect on enhancing the production of CH4, and both the CO2 storage rate and CH4 production rate increase with the increase of injection pressure. The effect of initial reservoir temperature on CO2-ECBM is obvious. Since the amount of adsorbed gas in coal decreases with the increase of temperature, the CO2 storage rate and CH4 production rate decrease with the increase of initial reservoir temperature. In the gas extraction process without CO2 injection, the variation of permeability is competition result of two types of factors: the coal matrix shrinkage caused by temperature reduction and gas desorption increase, the other is the coal matrix expansion caused by gas pressure decrease, so the permeability follows the rule of first decreasing and then increasing with the extraction time. The injection of CO2 has a great influence on the permeability of coalbed, adsorption of CO2 by the coal matrix causes the permeability to drop rapidly.