Numerical Study for the Performance of Viscoelastic Fluids on Displacing Oil Based on the Fractional-Order Maxwell Model

Abstract

In the study of polymer flooding, researchers usually ignore the genetic stress properties of viscoelastic fluids. In this paper, we investigate the process of viscoelastic fluid flooding the remaining oil in the dead end. This work uses the fractional-order Maxwell in the traditional momentum equation. Furthermore, a semi-analytic solution of the flow control equation for fractional-order viscoelastic fluids is derived, and the oil-repelling process of viscoelastic fluids is simulated by a secondary development of OpenFOAM. The results show that velocity fractional-order derivative α significantly affects polymer solution characteristics, and increasing the elasticity of the fluid can significantly improve the oil repelling efficiency. Compared to the Newtonian fluid flow model, the fractional order derivative a and relaxation time b in the two-parameter instanton equation can accurately characterize the degree of elasticity of the fluid. The smaller the a, the more elastic the fluid is and the higher the oil-repelling efficiency. The larger the b, the less elastic the fluid is and the lower the cancellation efficiency. Moreover, the disturbance of the polymer solution to the dead end is divided into two elastic perturbation areas. The stronger the elasticity of the polymer solution, the higher the peak value of the area in the dead end and the higher the final oil displacement efficiency.