Parametric Study of Polymer-Nanoparticles-Assisted Injectivity Performance for Axisymmetric Two-Phase Flow in EOR Processes

Abstract

Among a wide range of enhanced oil-recovery techniques, polymer flooding has been selected by petroleum industries due to the simplicity and lower cost of operational performances. The reason for this selection is due to the mobility-reduction of the water phase, facilitating the forward-movement of oil. The objective of this comprehensive study is to develop a mathematical model for simultaneous injection of polymer-assisted nanoparticles migration to calculate an oil-recovery factor. Then, a sensitivity analysis is provided to consider the significant influence of formation rheological characteristics as type curves. To achieve this, we concentrated on the driving mathematical equations for the recovery factor and compare each parameter significantly to nurture the differences explicitly. Consequently, due to the results of this extensive study, it is evident that a higher value of mobility ratio, higher polymer concentration and higher formation-damage coefficient leads to a higher recovery factor. The reason for this is that the external filter cake is being made in this period and the subsequent injection of polymer solution administered a higher sweep efficiency and higher recovery factor.