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Method to Evaluate the Potential of Water Injection in Naturally Fractured Reservoirs

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Abstract

Is there any method to study the feasibility of water injection into naturally fractured geothermal reservoirs before implementing liquid injection? How can we identify the difference of water injectability between different reservoirs? Spontaneous water imbibition tests in rocks from The Geysers and in Berea sandstone have been designed to answer these questions. The maximum water saturation and the maximum imbibition rate by spontaneous water imbibition were used to evaluate the feasibility and the ability of water injection into geothermal reservoirs. Reservoirs with high imbibition rates and high maximum water saturation are good candidates for water injection. If there is no imbibition of water into the rocks at all, then the reservoir is not suitable for water injection. The relationships between imbibition rate and time for The Geysers rocks have been measured under countercurrent and cocurrent imbibition conditions, respectively. The measured maximum water saturation by the spontaneous water imbibition in The Geysers rock was about 87.9%, which was greater than that in Berea although the imbibition rate was lower. Experimental results and the continuing practice of water injection in the field showed that The Geysers geothermal reservoir may be appropriate for water injection.

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Abbreviations

A :

cross-section area of the core

A i :

area open to imbibition at the ith direction

k :

rock permeability

k w :

effective permeability of water phase at a water saturation of S wf

L c :

characteristic length

N wt :

volume of water imbibed into the core boundary

P c :

capillary pressure at S wf

q w :

water imbibition rate

q wmax :

maximum water imbibition rate

S wf :

water saturation behind the imbibition front

S gr :

residual gas saturation in rocks

S wi :

initial water saturation, in this study, it was equal to zero

S wmax :

maximum water saturation

t :

imbibition time

t D :

dimensionless time

V :

bulk volume of the matrix

V p :

pore volume of the reservoir

X Ai :

distance traveled by the imbibition front from the open surface to the no-flow

σ :

interfacial tension between oil and water

\({\phi}\) :

porosity

θ :

contact angle

λ :

constant giving the rate of convergence in Eq. 1

μ m :

geometric mean of water and oil viscosities

μ w :

viscosity of water

η :

recovery in terms of recoverable resident fluid by spontaneous water imbibition

η * :

gas recovery in terms of gas originally in place

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Stanford University, Stanford, USA

    Kewen Li & Roland N. Horne

  2. Yangtze University, Hubei, china

    Kewen Li

Authors
  1. Kewen Li
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  2. Roland N. Horne
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Correspondence to Kewen Li.

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Li, K., Horne, R.N. Method to Evaluate the Potential of Water Injection in Naturally Fractured Reservoirs. Transp Porous Med 83, 699–709 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11242-009-9473-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11242-009-9473-3

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