IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wsi/ijmpcx/v24y2013i08ns0129183113500563.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Fractal Analysis Of Fracture Increasing Spontaneous Imbibition In Porous Media With Gas-Saturated

Author

Listed:
  • JIANCHAO CAI

    (Computational Transport Phenomena Laboratory, Division of Physical Science and Engineering, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Thuwal 23955-6900, Saudi Arabia;
    Key Laboratory of Tectonics and Petroleum Resources of Ministry of Education, Institute of Geophysics and Geomatics, China University of Geosciences, Wuhan 430074, P. R. China)

  • SHUYU SUN

    (Computational Transport Phenomena Laboratory, Division of Physical Science and Engineering, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Thuwal 23955-6900, Saudi Arabia)

Abstract

Spontaneous imbibition (SI) of wetting liquid into matrix blocks due to capillary pressure is regarded as an important recovery mechanism in low permeability fractured reservoir. In this paper, an analytical model is proposed for characterizing SI horizontally from a single plane fracture into gas-saturated matrix blocks. The presented model is based on the fractal character of pores in porous matrix, with gravity force included in the entire imbibition process. The accumulated mass of wetting liquid imbibed into matrix blocks is related to a number of factors such as contact area, pore fractal dimension, tortuosity, maximum pore size, porosity, liquid density and viscosity, surface tension, contact angle, as well as height and tilt angle of the fracture. The mechanism of fracture-enhanced SI is analyzed accordingly. Because of the effect of fracture, the gravity force is positive to imbibition process. Additionally, the farther away from the fracture top of the pore, the more influential the hydrostatic pressure is upon the imbibition action. The presented fractal analysis of horizontal spontaneous imbibition from a single fracture could also shed light on the scaling study of the mass transfer function between matrix and fracture system of fractured reservoirs.

Suggested Citation

  • Jianchao Cai & Shuyu Sun, 2013. "Fractal Analysis Of Fracture Increasing Spontaneous Imbibition In Porous Media With Gas-Saturated," International Journal of Modern Physics C (IJMPC), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 24(08), pages 1-13.
    • Handle: RePEc:wsi:ijmpcx:v:24:y:2013:i:08:n:s0129183113500563
    DOI: 10.1142/S0129183113500563
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S0129183113500563
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1142/S0129183113500563?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wsi:ijmpcx:v:24:y:2013:i:08:n:s0129183113500563. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Tai Tone Lim (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.worldscinet.com/ijmpc/ijmpc.shtml .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.