Reservoir Engineering – Equipment - The Use of Transparent Three-Dimensional Models for Studying the Mechanism of Flow Processes in Oil Reservoirs

This paper describes a technique which permits visual observation of oil displacement processes througlrout the interior of a porous structure as thick as 2 in. A model having glass walls is filled with finely powdered glass. Such a model becomes completely transparent if the powdered glass pack is saturated with an oil having the same refractive index as the glass. When water or gar, with a refractive index different from that of the oil (glass) is injected, the model becomes opaque in the space occupied by the water (gar). visual observation and photography of these displacement processes are thus rendered possible. The following processes have been studied: (I) displacement of oil by water (linear drive) in a homo-geneous formation and in a stratified formation, (2) water flooding (five-spot well pattern), (3) solution gas-drive process, and (4) oil-bank formation. INTRODUCTION Most of the scaled model experiments heretofore carried out in the Koninklijke/Shell Laboratorium, Amsterdam, have been done in steel containers, in which oil-saturated sand packs represented the oil-bearing formation. In such experiments, for instance those on the displacement of oil by water, the cumulative oil production was measured as a function of the cumulative water injection. In order to interpret the measured production data, a need has for some time been felt for a means of observing visually what happens in the course of such experiments. Some information of this kind was obtained earlier by observing the water-oil distribution in various cross sections of the sand after the conclusion of the experiment.' However, the technique used did not guarantee that the fluid distribution remained undisturbed. Moreover, the procedure was somewhat elaborate and the information obtained limited. Therefore a new technique has been developed, which is described below. DESCRIPTION OF EXPERIMENTAL TECHNIQUE AND APPARATUS Glass models simulating part of an oil reservoir are filled with ground Pyrex glass of a specific grain size, representing the porous structure of the prototype. Before an experiment is started, the porous formation has to be saturated completely with an oil having exactly the same refractive index as the Pyrex glass powder. All light-scattering surfaces of the glass grains become invisible and the formation is then transparent. If the oil is displaced by another fluid (e.g. by water in a water-drive experiment, or by gas liberated from the oil in a solution gas-drive experiment) the formation becomes opaque in the region where the oil is expelled from the rock.* The back of the apparatus is painted black and illumination is from the front; therefore, in the photographs of the experiments, the oil-bearing formation appears black, whereas the water- or gas-invaded areas are white.