Studying the Effect of Hysteresis of Relative Phase Permeability on Optimal Strategies of Water-Gas Impact on Oil Reservoirs

Abstract

We investigate three-phase flows in porous media caused by carbon dioxide and water injection into an oil reservoir. We construct a numerical model of the flow complicated by the phase transitions between oil and gas and the hysteresis changes in the gas relative permeability. The model is coupled with the economic estimates of the profitability of oil recovery. Using a numerical model, we estimate the effect of the hysteresis on the most profitable strategies of the alternating injection of water and carbon dioxide. We show that the hysteresis behavior requires the injection of larger volumes of gas to maximize the profit.