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Open AccessArticle
Improved Amott Method to Determine Oil Recovery Dynamics from Water-Wet Limestone Using GEV Statistics
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Ali I. Al-Naimi Petroleum Engineering Research Center, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal 23955, Saudi Arabia
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The Exploration and Petroleum Engineering Center-Advanced Research Center (EXPEC ARC), Saudi Aramco, Dhahran 31311, Saudi Arabia
3
Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering Department, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Energies 2024, 17(14), 3599; https://doi.org/10.3390/en17143599 (registering DOI)
Submission received: 10 May 2024
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Revised: 25 June 2024
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Accepted: 9 July 2024
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Published: 22 July 2024
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.
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MDPI and ACS Style
Kaprielova, K.M.; Yutkin, M.P.; Mowafi, M.; Gmira, A.; Ayirala, S.; Yousef, A.; Radke, C.J.; Patzek, T.W.
Improved Amott Method to Determine Oil Recovery Dynamics from Water-Wet Limestone Using GEV Statistics. Energies 2024, 17, 3599.
https://doi.org/10.3390/en17143599
AMA Style
Kaprielova KM, Yutkin MP, Mowafi M, Gmira A, Ayirala S, Yousef A, Radke CJ, Patzek TW.
Improved Amott Method to Determine Oil Recovery Dynamics from Water-Wet Limestone Using GEV Statistics. Energies. 2024; 17(14):3599.
https://doi.org/10.3390/en17143599
Chicago/Turabian Style
Kaprielova, Ksenia M., Maxim P. Yutkin, Mahmoud Mowafi, Ahmed Gmira, Subhash Ayirala, Ali Yousef, Clayton J. Radke, and Tadeusz W. Patzek.
2024. "Improved Amott Method to Determine Oil Recovery Dynamics from Water-Wet Limestone Using GEV Statistics" Energies 17, no. 14: 3599.
https://doi.org/10.3390/en17143599
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