Improved Amott Method to Determine Oil Recovery Dynamics from Water-Wet Limestone Using GEV Statistics

Ksenia M. Kaprielova, Maxim P. Yutkin, Mahmoud Mowafi, Ahmed Gmira, Subhash Ayirala, Ali Yousef, Clayton J. Radke and Tadeusz W. Patzek ()
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Ksenia M. Kaprielova: Ali I. Al-Naimi Petroleum Engineering Research Center, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal 23955, Saudi Arabia
Maxim P. Yutkin: Ali I. Al-Naimi Petroleum Engineering Research Center, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal 23955, Saudi Arabia
Mahmoud Mowafi: Ali I. Al-Naimi Petroleum Engineering Research Center, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal 23955, Saudi Arabia
Ahmed Gmira: The Exploration and Petroleum Engineering Center-Advanced Research Center (EXPEC ARC), Saudi Aramco, Dhahran 31311, Saudi Arabia
Subhash Ayirala: The Exploration and Petroleum Engineering Center-Advanced Research Center (EXPEC ARC), Saudi Aramco, Dhahran 31311, Saudi Arabia
Ali Yousef: The Exploration and Petroleum Engineering Center-Advanced Research Center (EXPEC ARC), Saudi Aramco, Dhahran 31311, Saudi Arabia
Clayton J. Radke: Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering Department, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA
Tadeusz W. Patzek: Ali I. Al-Naimi Petroleum Engineering Research Center, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal 23955, Saudi Arabia

Energies, 2024, vol. 17, issue 14, 1-20

Abstract: Counter-current spontaneous imbibition of water is a critical oil recovery mechanism. In the laboratory, the Amott test is a commonly used method to assess the efficacy of brine imbibition into oil-saturated core plugs. The classic Amott-cell experiment estimates ultimate oil recovery, but not the recovery dynamics that hold fundamental information about the imbibition mechanisms. Retention of oil droplets at the outer core surface and initial production delay are the two key artifacts of the classic Amott experiment. This retention, referred to here as the “external-surface oil holdup effect” or simply “oil holdup effect”, often results in stepwise recovery curves that obscure the true dynamics of spontaneous imbibition. To address these holdup drawbacks of the classic Amott method, we modified the Amott cell and experimental procedure. For the first time, using water-wet Indiana limestone cores saturated with brine and mineral oil, we showed that our improvements of the Amott method enabled accurate and reproducible measurements of oil recovery dynamics. Also for the first time, we used the generalized extreme value (GEV) statistics to describe oil production histories from water-wet heterogeneous limestone cores with finite initial water saturations. We demonstrated that our four-parameter GEV model accurately described the recovery dynamics, and that optimal GEV parameter values systematically reflected the key characteristics of the oil–rock system, such as oil viscosity and rock permeability. These findings gave us a more fundamental understanding of spontaneous, counter-current imbibition mechanisms and insights into what constitutes a predictive model of counter-current water imbibition into oil-saturated rocks with finite initial water saturation.

Keywords: counter-current spontaneous imbibition; mineral oil; finite (non-zero) initial water saturation; oil recovery modeling (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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