Deep-Bed Filtration Under Multiple Particle-Capture Mechanisms

Abstract

Summary Severe injectivity decline during seawater injection and produced-water reinjection is a serious problem in offshore waterflood projects. The permeability impairment occurs because of the capture of particles from injected water by the rock, both internally in the pores and externally in a filter cake. The reliable modeling-based prediction of injectivity decline is important for injected-water-treatment design and management (injection of seawater or produced water, water filtering, etc.). The classical deep-bed filtration model includes a single overall description of particle capture. During laboratory or field data interpretation using this model, it is usually assumed that several simultaneously occurring capture mechanisms are represented in the model by a single overall mechanism. The filtration coefficient, obtained by fitting the model to the laboratory or field data, represents the total kinetics of the particle capture. The purpose of this study is to justify this approach of using an aggregated single filtration coefficient. A multiple-retention deep-bed filtration model needs to describe several simultaneous capture mechanisms. The kinetics of the different capture mechanisms can differ from one another by several orders of magnitude. This greatly affects the particle propagation in natural reservoirs and the resulting formation damage. In this study, a model for deep-bed filtration taking into account multiple particle-retention mechanisms is discussed. It is proven that the multicapture model can be reduced to a single-capture-mechanism deep-bed filtration model. The method for determination of the capture kinetics for all individual capture processes from the breakthrough curve is discussed. As an example, the complete characterization of filtration with monolayer and multilayer deposition of iron oxide colloids is performed using particle-breakthrough curves from coreflooding.