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Experimental design for enhancing CO2 storage using chemical additives
Experimental Technology and Management 2024, 41(1): 130-135
Published: 20 January 2024
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[Objective]

Carbon dioxide (CO2) displacement and storage are the most viable technologies for achieving carbon neutralization and enhancing low-permeability reservoir recovery. The current research focused on the evaluation of CO2 storage capacity and mechanism under different geological conditions but ignored the problem of CO2 storage time being too long. When CO2 was injected into the stratum for geological burial, it mainly existed in the form of geological structure burial in the initial stage of injection (within several decades), and the safety was relatively low. In the middle stage of injection (within 100 years), it changed from geological structure burial to bound storage and gradually to dissolved storage, and the safety was relatively good at this time. In the later stage of injection (thousands of years), the storage forms were mainly dissolved storage and mineralized storage, and the safety was the highest. Therefore, through laboratory experiments, studying how to improve CO2 mineralization and storage speed and shorten the CO2 storage time using chemical agents is of great significance.

[Methods]

Based on the actual CO2 storage technology in reservoirs, a CO2 storage experimental device under formation temperature and pressure conditions was independently built, and multimedia-assisted CO2 storage experimental research was conducted. The precipitation of potassium carbonate through the utilization of the ethanol + KOH solution system enabled CO2 capture and carbonization. The reaction process in the solution system was affected by the ethanol concentration, resulting in different CO2 carbonization amounts with the change in the ethanol concentration. Simultaneously, the precipitation-generated potassium-based acid salt could undergo a reaction with water to facilitate ethanol regeneration. This paper utilized experimental methods to investigate the CO2 capture efficiency of the ethanol + KOH system, real-time monitoring of ethanol content in the solution, and identification of the optimal ethanol concentration for the formation temperature. The solution was supplemented with KOH, followed by the utilization of regenerated ethanol from the solution’s carbonization reaction for subsequent carbonization, enabling the determination of the maximum CO2 capture capacity of the ethanol + KOH system. The CO2 burial experiment was conducted using a high-temperature and high-pressure core displacement device after injecting the ethanol + KOH solution. The characteristics of CO2 mineralization under different permeability/porosity conditions were discussed.

[Results]

The research results indicated that the 96% ethanol + 3-g KOH solution demonstrated effective CO2 capture, resulting in an average precipitation of 4.56 g per capture. Simultaneously, following the saturation of the core with the 96% ethanol + 3-g KOH solution, CO2 injection was conducted to induce sediment formation, resulting in a reduction in core permeability of approximately 16.01%. After CO2 mineralization and burial, the average porosity of the low-permeability core decreased by 7.07%, and the porosity change rate was positively correlated with porosity. The results of the CO2 storage experiment indicated that after the action of the 96% ethanol + 3-g KOH solution, CO2 could be effectively captured in the form of precipitates in the reservoir, with the largest degree of capture in medium to large pores. Compared with formation water, the composite solution studied in this paper can improve the CO2 storage efficiency by 30%. The 96% ethanol + 3-g KOH solution can accelerate the CO2 precipitation process in the reservoir and shorten the mineralization and storage time of CO2 in the reservoir.

[Conclusions]

This study proposed a new method to increase CO2 storage capacity by injecting a KOH + ethanol solution into a formation to improve CO2 mineralization and storage efficiency. Moreover, it realized the effective integration of the chemical industry and petroleum engineering disciplines and provided a new research approach for carbon peaking and carbon neutrality.

Issue
High temperature and high pressure shale imbibition experimental system design
Experimental Technology and Management 2023, 40(9): 91-94,101
Published: 20 September 2023
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Combined with the mechanism of shale oil reservoir imbibition to enhance oil recovery, a set of high-temperature and high-pressure shale imbibition experimental system is designed. According to its built-in imbibition displacement system, it can simulate the imbibition effect of shale oil reservoir during shut-in, simulate the pressure and temperature conditions of the reservoir through the temperature and pressure coordination control system, and accurately measure the core weight or imbibition fluid volume in combination with the data acquisition system. This system can carry out research on factors affecting shale imbibition and evaluate the imbibition recovery effect of shale oil reservoir. It has applicability and accuracy, and is conducive to stimulating students' innovative spirit, cultivating interdisciplinary thinking, and strengthening the ability to solve practical engineering problems in unity and cooperation.

Open Access Original Article Issue
Imbibition behaviors in shale nanoporous media from pore-scale perspectives
Capillarity 2023, 9(2): 32-44
Published: 14 October 2023
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In shale reservoirs, spontaneous imbibition is an important mechanism of fracturing fluid loss, which has an important impact on enhanced oil recovery and water resource demand. However, spontaneous imbibition behaviors are more complicated to characterize and clarify due to the nanoscale effects of the boundary slip, oil-water interfacial slip, and heterogeneous fluid properties caused by intermolecular interactions. A nanoscale multi-relaxation-time multicomponent and multiphase lattice Boltzmann method was applied to investigate the water imbibition into oil-saturated nanoscale space. The effects of pore size, fluid-surface slip, water film, oil-water interfacial slip, water bridge, and pore structures on the imbibition behaviors in a single nanopore were investigated. Then, the spontaneous imbibition behaviors in nanoporous media based on the pore scale microsimulation parameters obtained from the molecular simulation velocity results were simulated, and the effects of water saturations on imbibition behaviors were discussed. The results show that as the water saturation increases from 0 to 0.1, the imbibition mass in nanoporous media increases because of the oil-water interfacial slip and a completely hydrophilic wall. As water saturation continues to increase, the imbibition mass decreases gradually because the existence of water bridges impedes the water imbibition.

Open Access Original Paper Issue
A semi-analytical model for coupled flow in stress-sensitive multi-scale shale reservoirs with fractal characteristics
Petroleum Science 2024, 21(1): 327-342
Published: 05 October 2023
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A large number of nanopores and complex fracture structures in shale reservoirs results in multi-scale flow of oil. With the development of shale oil reservoirs, the permeability of multi-scale media undergoes changes due to stress sensitivity, which plays a crucial role in controlling pressure propagation and oil flow. This paper proposes a multi-scale coupled flow mathematical model of matrix nanopores, induced fractures, and hydraulic fractures. In this model, the micro-scale effects of shale oil flow in fractal nanopores, fractal induced fracture network, and stress sensitivity of multi-scale media are considered. We solved the model iteratively using Pedrosa transform, semi-analytic Segmented Bessel function, Laplace transform. The results of this model exhibit good agreement with the numerical solution and field production data, confirming the high accuracy of the model. As well, the influence of stress sensitivity on permeability, pressure and production is analyzed. It is shown that the permeability and production decrease significantly when induced fractures are weakly supported. Closed induced fractures can inhibit interporosity flow in the stimulated reservoir volume (SRV). It has been shown in sensitivity analysis that hydraulic fractures are beneficial to early production, and induced fractures in SRV are beneficial to middle production. The model can characterize multi-scale flow characteristics of shale oil, providing theoretical guidance for rapid productivity evaluation.

Open Access Original Article Issue
Pseudopotential-based multiple-relaxation-time lattice Boltzmann model for multicomponent and multiphase slip flow
Advances in Geo-Energy Research 2023, 9(2): 106-116
Published: 03 August 2023
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The microscale liquid flow in nanoscale systems considering slip boundary has been widely studied in recent years, however, they are limited to single-phase flow. As in nature, multicomponent and multiphase flows can also exist with non-zero slip velocities, such as oil/water slip flow in nanoporous shale. In this paper, a novel multicomponent-multiphase multiple-relaxation-time lattice Boltzmann method with a combinational slip boundary condition is developed to study the two-phase slip flow behaviors. The proposed combined slip boundary condition is derived from adjustments to the conventional diffusive Maxwell’s reflection and half-way bounce-back scheme boundary parameters, incorporating a compelled conservation requirement. With the analysis of simulations for the layer, slug, and droplet types of two-phase flow in single pores, and two-phase flow in porous media with complex wall geometry, it can be concluded that the proposed schemes of two-phase slip boundary conditions are particularly suitable for multicomponent and multiphase flow with a non-zero slip velocity. The proposed model can be used to determine relative permeability and simulate spontaneous imbibition in particular in shale reservoirs where those flow properties are hard-to-determine.

Open Access Original Article Issue
Capillary and viscous forces during CO2 flooding in tight reservoirs
Capillarity 2022, 5(6): 105-114
Published: 10 October 2022
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In this study, the multiphase multicomponent Shan-Chen lattice Boltzmann method is employed to analyze the impact of capillary force on oil-CO2-water fluid flow and enhanced oil recovery. Various sizes of the single throat are designed to simulate the interaction between displacing and displaced phases as well as their mechanical equilibrium. Several sensitivities are taken into account, such as wettability, miscibility, interfacial tension, and pore aperture. Based on the objective reservoir conditions, supercritical CO2 as an injection fluid is adopted to study the influence of different displacement patterns on the mechanical equilibrium in both homogenous and heterogeneous porous media, in which enhanced oil recovery is also quantitatively estimated. The results show that the water-alternating-gas injection pattern reduces the moving speed of the leading edge by increasing the swept area of the residual oil, and inhibits the breakthrough effect of the gas, making it the optimal displacement method in terms of the degree of oil production. Compared with the results of different displacement patterns, the enhanced oil recovery of water-alternating-gas injection is the highest, followed by supercritical CO2 flooding after water flooding, and lastly, continuous supercritical CO2 flooding.

Open Access Invited Review Issue
A review of stimulated reservoir volume characterization for multiple fractured horizontal well in unconventional reservoirs
Advances in Geo-Energy Research 2017, 1(1): 54-63
Published: 25 June 2017
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Unconventional resource exploration has boosted U.S. oil and gas production, which is successfully by horizontal well drilling and hydraulic fracturing. The horizontal well with multiple transverse fractures has proven to be effective stimulation approach could increase reservoir contact significantly. Unlike the single fracture planes in typical low permeability sands, fractures in shales tends to generate more complex, branching networks. The concept of stimulated reservoir volume was developed to quantitative measure of multistage fracture interact with natural fractures in unconventional reservoir. However, the simple fracture modeling of the past do not suitable for the complex scenarios simulation. This paper reviews the mainstream characterization method of stimulated reservoir volume in shale reservoirs, including microseismic interpretation, rate transient analysis method, analytical and semi-analytical method and numerical method. Finally, the systematic evaluation of application conditions with respect to each method and further research directions for characterization method are proposed.

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