Effects of pore characteristics on water-oil two-phase displacement in non-homogeneous pore structures: a pore-scale lattice Boltzmann model considering various fluid density ratios (Q784969)

A 2D pore-scale multi component lattice Boltzmann model (LBM) was developed to study the water-oil displacement in non-homogeneous pore structures. Different pore size distributions are considered, for identical topological skeletons and porosities. Two main elements are highlighted: the possible preferential pathways which can appear in secondary petroleum recovery and the effect of the pore size distribution on immiscible displacement. A large number of papers exists in this topic -- see [\textit{M. Z. Guo} et al., Commun. Math. Phys. 118, No. 1, 31--59 (1988; Zbl 0652.60107); \textit{Y. Ju} et al., ``Prediction of preferential fluid flow in porous structures based on topological network models: algorithm and experimental validation'', Sci. China Tech. Sci. 61, No. 8, 1217--1227 (2018; \url{doi:10.1007/s11431-017-9171-x})] and references therein. The new element is a comparison between different numerical methods, in order to shut down the water production during the secondary exploitation of old petroleum reservoirs. The different pore structures are generated by using the SNOW algorithm -- see [\textit{J. T. Gostick}, ``Versatile and efficient pore network extraction method using marker-based watershed segmentation'', Phys. Rev. E, 96, No. 2, Article ID 023307, 15 p. (2017; \url{doi:10.1103/PhysRevE.96.023307})]. The phase segregation, due to the interfacial tension which separates both fluids, is modeled by using the algorithm proposed in [\textit{M. Latva-Kokko}, and \textit{D. H. Rothman}, ``Diffusion properties of gradient-based lattice Boltzmann models of immiscible fluids'', Phys. Rev. E 71, No. 5, Article ID 056702, 8 p. (2005; \url{doi:10.1103/PhysRevE.71.056702})]. A large reference list is given in the last part, containing recent results in the field.