Hele-shaw cell experiment using polymer flooding
Aim:
The aim of this experiment is to find the displacement efficiency, front stability, sweep
efficiency and total oil recovery using Hele-shaw cell packed with glass spheres. This
is done by changing the concentration of xanthan polymer for three different cases.
In this experiment we also compare the polymer effect when the concentration
changes in each case and finally the mobility ratio has to be calculated using the
given data. Some plots comparing the cumulative oil produced and areal sweep
efficiency as a function of time.
Materials and method:
● Mobility ratio (M) is estimated for the three C using the equation 𝑀 = μ𝑑/μ𝑖,
Where μ𝑖 & μ𝑑 are the dynamic viscosities of the injected and defending fluids.
Case 1: (C = 0%)
μ𝑖 = 1
μ𝑑 = oil viscosity = kinematic viscosity × density = 73.45 × 0.9169 = 67.3463
Mobility ratio M = μ𝑑/μ𝑖 = 67.3463/1 = 67.3463
Case 2: (C = 0.05)
μ𝑖 = 300 mPa s
μ𝑑 = 67.3463
Mobility ratio M = 0.2244
Case 3: (C = 0.2%)
μ𝑖 = 2260 mPa s
μ𝑑 = 67.3463
Mobility ratio M = 0.0297
● Experimental setup:
Figure 1: Hele-shaw cell packed with glass pheres with pore volume of the
packed bed which is filled with oil. (snapshot taken from the experimental brief
by [Link]).
In this experiment, 150mm*150mm Hele-shaw cell packed with glass spheres of Soi=
100% is build which is oil saturated and it has one injection and a production wells.
The injection part is connected to a syringe pump to inject 1.5 pore volumes of
polymer into the cell. In this experiment we consider three different cases of
concentration that is C=0% which is water flooding, C=0.05% and C=0.2%. When
the experiment starts, fluid from the syringe starts to flow to the injection point at that
moment timer is started to note the time period at which the liquid displaces oil till
water breakthrough and at a particular point fluid completely displaces oil and
injected fluid is then collected in the cylinder along with oil.
When the polymer is injected into the cell displacement of oil by the fluid happens
over time and the cumulative oil and water produced is measured in a measuring
cylinder at the other corner of the cell. During the process, outline of the polymer
front is traced using an acetate sheet on top of the cell and using the measured area
over time is noted and areal sweep efficiency is determined.
Using the calculated cumulative oil production data, a plot has been made as a
function of time to compare all the three C and plot of areal sweep efficiency versus
time is determined using the produced data.
To find out the areal sweep efficiency an acetate sheet is used and the outline of the
polymer front is drawn to determine the area at different intervals till the end of the
experiment. Areal sweep efficiency is the area contacted by the fluid divided by the
total area. Both the areas are calculated from the graph and a plot is made to
compare the difference is sweep efficiency over time.
Results:
● Outlines of the polymer front at the selected times of all the three cases are
shown below:
Figure 2 (C=0%): snapshot of the acetate
sheet having outline of front shape of water
flooding where concentration of polymer
solution is 0%.
Figure 3 (C=0.05%): Snapshot showing the outline of front shape when the
concentration of polymer xanthan solution is 0.05%.
Figure 4 (C=0.2%): snapshot indicating the outlines over time of the front shape
when the concentration of polymer solution is 0.2%.
● Plot of cumulative oil production as a function of time of all three cases are
shown below:
Figure 5: graph showing cumulative oil production versus time for three
different cases. Blue dots indicates c=0%, grey dots shows c=0.05% and orange
dots showing c=0.2% polymer solution.
● Plot of areal sweep efficiency as a function of time is shown below:
Figure 6: plot showing the areal sweep efficiency versus time. Blue dots
indicates C=0%, grey triangles shows c=0.05% and orange squared denotes
c=0.2%.
Discussion:
● In this experiment the shape of the front, sweep efficiency and oil recovery of
all the three cases have been analysed and we can see that when the
concentration of the polymer is increased, the shape of the front becomes
more wider and hence the sweep increases along with good oil recovery.
When the concentration is 0%, the shape of the front is sharp and less sweep
efficiency which results in low oil recovery of 28 PV because of the high
mobility ratio. When the concentration of the polymer was increased to 0.05%,
shape of the front was wider compared to C=0% and also oil production has
increased to 63 PV. Here we can conclude that the polymer with higher
concentration C = 0.2% makes it more viscous than water and helps to push
maximum amount of oil in the cell having recovery of 63 mL.
● Important differences we can notice here is that when concentration changes
the output difference occur as we discussed for three C which shows higher
the concentration higher is the oil recovery and the trend is that if the
concentration is increased more then the final result would be more efficient.
● Main properties that control the displacement behaviour are viscosity,
wettability and capillary pressure. When the liquid is more viscous, higher the
result would be as it sweeps maximum oil from one corner to other which will
also result it late water breakthrough. When capillary pressure is high then it
takes more energy to push the oil to the production well.
Acknowledgement:
I would like thank Dr. [Link] and Dr. Amin sharifi for proving the instructions and
data’s used to finish the experiment. I would also like to thank university of
Aberdeen for giving such a wonderful chance to learn more deeply about the
enhanced oil recovery methods.
References:
Verbanic, S.; Brady, O.; Sanda, A.; Gustafson, C.; Donhauser, Z.J. A novel
general chemistry laboratory: Creation of biomimetic superhydrophobic surfaces
through replica molding. J. Chem. Educ. 2014, 91, 1477–1480,
doi:10.1021/ed4007056.
Enhanced Oil Recovery by Polymer Flooding: Direct, Low-Cost Visualization in a
Hele–Shaw Cell, Yukie Tanino and Amer Syed, university of Aberdeen; published
17 July 2019.
Enhanced oil recovery Assessment lab brief.