Imperial College London
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DrBrankoBijeljic

Faculty of Engineering, Department of Earth Science & Engineering

Principal Research Fellow
 
 
 
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Contact

 

+44 (0)20 7594 6420b.bijeljic

 
 
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Location

 

2.53Royal School of MinesSouth Kensington Campus

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Summary

 

Publications

Citation

BibTex format

@article{Zhang:2023:10.1016/j.jhydrol.2023.130022,
author = {Zhang, G and Regaieg, M and Blunt, MJ and Bijeljic, B},
doi = {10.1016/j.jhydrol.2023.130022},
journal = {Journal of Hydrology},
title = {Primary drainage and waterflood capillary pressures and fluid displacement in a mixed-wet microporous reservoir carbonate},
url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2023.130022},
volume = {625},
year = {2023}
}
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RIS format (EndNote, RefMan)

TY  - JOUR
AB  - A porous plate technique was developed to measure capillary pressure during both primary drainage and waterflooding in a reservoir carbonate rock sample. During primary drainage, a water-wet ceramic disc at the end of the sample allowed brine to be displaced but prevented the escape of oil while oil was injected at a sequence of increasing pressures. Saturation was measured using high-resolution three-dimensional X-ray imaging from the differences in greyscale (X-ray adsorption) between dry, partially-saturated and completely-saturated images. A two-step displacement process was observed, with the resolvable macro-pores displaced by oil followed by invasion into unresolved micro-porosity with a variation of two orders of magnitude in capillary pressure. The sample was then exposed to crude oil to render some of the solid surfaces oil-wet. A small amount of spontaneous imbibition (displacement at a positive capillary pressure) was observed in micro-porosity. Then an oil-wet porous plate was added to the outlet, so that water could be injected at a sequence of increasing pressures while only oil could escape. As expected, the oil-wet macro-porosity was displaced by brine at a low capillary pressure with a magnitude similar to that seen during drainage (but of opposite sign). Remarkably though the displacement of oil from micro-porosity occurred at a capillary pressure approximately an order of magnitude lower than in drainage, implying the existence of mixed-wettability with fluid menisci that are approximately minimal surfaces. The work demonstrates that in mixed-wet media displacement of oil from micro-porosity can occur at much lower capillary pressures that would be estimated from primary drainage results using the calculated pore size distribution.
AU  - Zhang,G
AU  - Regaieg,M
AU  - Blunt,MJ
AU  - Bijeljic,B
DO  - 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2023.130022
PY  - 2023///
SN  - 0022-1694
TI  - Primary drainage and waterflood capillary pressures and fluid displacement in a mixed-wet microporous reservoir carbonate
T2  - Journal of Hydrology
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2023.130022
UR  - http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/106714
VL  - 625
ER  -
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