Wormhole Propagation Behavior and Its Effect on Acid Leakoff under In Situ Conditions in Acid Fracturing

Abstract

In acid fracturing, excessive acid leakoff is thought to be the main reason that limits fracture propagation and live acid penetration distance. Although acid leakoff has been studied under experimental conditions, the acid leakoff theory developed under experimental conditions cannot be extended to in situ conditions because the injection rate or pressure drop across a core plug is fixed in the experiments. In this paper, we used a model that couples a two-scale continuum model simulating wormholing in the invaded zone and a reservoir flow model for the compressed zone to simulate acid leakoff process under in situ conditions. Based on this model, we investigated wormhole propagation behavior and its effect on acid leakoff under in situ conditions. The study shows different wormhole propagation behavior under in situ conditions from that under experimental conditions. Wormholes grow fast at the beginning and slow down at later time due to the rise of reservoir pressure caused by the leakoff and the growth of the invaded zone. In oil reservoirs, wormholing has minor effect on acid leakoff because of small compressibility and relatively high reservoir fluid viscosity, but in gas reservoirs, the influence of wormholing on acid leakoff becomes significant due to large compressibility and low reservoir fluid viscosity. Acid viscosity has more notable influence on acid leakoff in gas reservoirs than in oil reservoirs.