scholarly journals Conformance Control for SAGD Using Oil-in-Water Emulsions in Heterogeneous Oil Sands Reservoirs

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yidan Ni ◽  
Boxin Ding ◽  
Long Yu ◽  
Mingzhe Dong ◽  
Ian D. Gates ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Oil Sands ◽  
Conformance Control ◽  
Oil In Water

An Improved Study of Emulsion Flooding for Conformance Control in a Heterogeneous 2D Model with Lean Zones

SPE Journal ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1-15
Author(s):  
Boxin Ding ◽  
Qian Sang ◽  
Zhiquan Nie ◽  
Zhaowen Li ◽  
Mingzhe Dong ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Porous Media ◽  
Oil Sands ◽  
Control Method ◽  
Retention Rate ◽  
High Water ◽  
Heterogeneous Porous Media ◽  
Water Mobility ◽  
Conformance Control ◽  
Emulsion Flow ◽  
2D Model

Summary Use of oil-in-water (O/W) emulsion has shown its potential for conformance control in heterogeneous porous media, yet it is essential to understand how to improve the conformance control performance in the heterogeneous 2D model with lean zones before it is applied in the fields. In this paper, an O/W emulsion-based conformance control method is improved through newly designed flow tests and optimized modeling study. A heterogeneous 2D model was designed with a high water mobility zone (HWMZ) and a low water mobility zone (LWMZ) separated by a horizontal injection well to mimic real oil sands with lean zones (top- or bottomwater) and with application of horizontal wells. Optimal conformance control strategies were proposed and examined in the 2D model by injecting correspondingly designed O/W emulsions. In an improvement of our previously proposed emulsion flow model (Ding et al. 2020c), we introduce the real phenomena of permeability reduction (PR) coefficients in this paper to describe the three ambiguous coefficients: flow distribution coefficient (γ), plugging coefficient (α), and retention rate coefficient (a). This newly developed model can incorporate with characteristics of the emulsion and the heterogeneous porous media through the introduction of the experimentally derived PR coefficient. It is well established in COMSOL Multiphysics® (COMSOL AB 2005), and the modeling results show good agreement with the experimentally monitored results in the three types of flow tests. This work bridges experimental and mathematical studies on emulsion flow in 2D models associated with lean zones and is able to provide a guide on optimal emulsion design and injection strategy for optimal conformance control performances.

Megaloads and Mobilization

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-7
Author(s):  
Corrie Grosse
Keyword(s):  
Oil Sands ◽  
Fossil Fuel ◽  
Cost Effective ◽  
Nez Perce ◽  
Grassroots Organizations ◽  
Canadian Province ◽  
Creation Story ◽  
Oil Companies ◽  
Heavy Crude ◽  
Ways Of Life

From 2011 to 2014 fossil fuel corporations trucked tar sands processing machinery along rural Idaho highways. The machinery was bound for the world's largest deposits of tar or oil sands, a heavy crude oil substance called bitumen, located in the western Canadian province of Alberta. These loads of machinery, what became known as megaloads, encountered much resistance. Throughout Idaho and the surrounding region, a network organized opposition. Neighbors, grassroots organizations, nonprofits, and the Nez Perce and other tribes all collaborated. They held information sessions, protested, waged legal battles, monitored the loads, and blockaded highways. What oil companies hoped would be a cost-effective solution for transporting their megaloads became a David versus Goliath, Coyote versus the Monster—to reference the Nez Perce creation story—struggle to protect rural and indigenous ways of life and sovereignty, and the planet.

Improvements to production planning in oil sands mining through analysis and simulation of truck cycle times

CIM Journal ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Goris Cervantes ◽  
S. P. Upadhyay ◽  
H. Askari-Nasab
Keyword(s):  
Production Planning ◽  
Oil Sands ◽  
Cycle Times ◽  
Oil Sands Mining
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