228 April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering

Effect of Salinity on Wettability Alteration to Intermediate Gas-Wetting

Stanley Wu, SPE, and Abbas Firoozabadi, SPE, Reservoir Engineering Research Institute (RERI)

SummaryThe effect of salinity on the alteration of wettability from water-wetting to intermediate gas-wetting is studied in this work. We find that NaCl salinity increases water-wetting when a core is saturated with brine. NaCl also reduces gas absolute permeability, as reported in the literature. CaCl2 salinity effect is dramatically different from that of NaCl brine and has a minor effect on perme-ability. The NaCl, KCl, and CaCl2 brines have an adverse effect on wettability alteration. To alleviate the effect of salt on chemical treatment, we suggest pretreatment by displacement of brine with water and subsequent drainage by nitrogen.

IntroductionA reduction in gas effective permeability observed in tight forma-tions and in low-permeability gas reservoirs is often attributed to water blocking and condensate accumulation. The water blocking is induced by the injection of water in hydraulic fracturing (Engi-neer 1985; Cimolai et al. 1993). The condensate accumulates at the wellbore as the pressure drops below the dewpoint pressure (Barnum et al. 1995; El-Banbi et al. 2000). A major effect of liquid retention in a rock is the liquid’s low mobility because of strong liquid-wetting (Anderson 1987a, 1987b). By altering the wettability of the rock from liquid-wetting to intermediate gas-wetting, an increase in liquid mobility can be achieved resulting in a high rate of gas production. Li and Firoozabadi (2000) pioneered the alteration of wettability by fluorochemical treatment and demonstrated significant changes in contact angle and imbibition testing in treated cores. Following their work, there have been a number of experimental studies on wet-tability alteration to intermediate gas-wetting (Tang and Firoozabadi 2002, 2003; Kumar et al. 2006; Fahes and Firoozabadi 2007; Panga et al. 2007; Al-Anazi et al. 2007). Most of the work on wettability alteration has been performed by injection of chemicals into a core initially saturated with air or nitrogen (i.e., the dry core). In some cases, the rock has been saturated with water or oils.

The reservoir rock before the chemical treatment is partially saturated with liquid condensate and the aqueous phase that may be connate water, condensed water from the gas, or water from the aquifer. There is always a definite amount of ions in the subsurface water. For example, condensed water from gas may have 140–150 mg/L of chloride ion, and the fracturing-fluid water may have ≈25 mg/L chloride ion. One of the main parameters in wettability and imbibition studies is the water composition that can affect the wet-tability. On the basis of spontaneous imbibition and waterflooding tests at reservoir temperatures in Berea sandstone with three crude oils and three reservoir brines, Tang and Morrow (1997) found that the salinity of the connate water and invading brines can have a major influence on wettability and oil recovery. Zhang and Aus-tad (2006) verified that the ions Ca2+ and SO4

2− could increase the water-wetting of chalk, and thereby increase the water/oil capillary pressure of matrix blocks. There is an abrupt change in the zeta potential when only small amounts of ions are added to the aqueous solution. Tweheyo et al. (2006) studied the effect of divalent ions on wettability alteration of carbonates and the subsequent effect on oil recovery by spontaneous imbibition. They found that SO4

2−, Ca2+, and Mg2+ ions can change the wettability to more water-wetting

at 100°C and greater without surfactants. The three divalent ions seem to have different effects in the alteration of wettability and in spontaneous imbibition.

Cores in three different states of preservation are used in core analysis: native state, cleaned, and restored state (Anderson 1986). Noh and Firoozabadi (2008) found that the chemical treatment of cores initially saturated with either water or normal decane might reduce the effectiveness of the wettability alteration slightly compared with that in a dry core. The wettability of original water-wet reservoir rocks can be altered by the adsorption of polar compounds and/or the deposition of organic materials that are originally in the crude oil (Anderson 1986). Multivalent cations sometimes enhance the adsorption of surfactants on the mineral surface (Gaudin and Chang 1952; Somasundaran 1975). Gupta and Mohanty (2008) studied the oil recovery from initially oil-wet fractured carbonate reservoirs by wettability alteration with dilute surfactants and electrolyte solutions. They found that there exists an optimal chemical concentration for varying salinity and an optimal salinity for varying surfactant concentration at which the wettability alteration is the maximum for an anionic surfactantant. As the salinity increases, the extent of maximum wettability altera-tion decreases for a surfactant, but the surfactant concentration decreases for the maximum wettability alteration.

One concern of the salinity in chemical treatment is that the dissociated ions may destroy the stability of chemical polymers, resulting in colloidal coagulation (Hiemenz and Rajagopalan 1997) and leading to permeability reduction. The alcohols, which are often used as the solvent for chemical solutions (Panga et al. 2006, 2007) to reduce gas hydrate formation in drilling and production operations, have a significant adverse effect on the solubility of salts, increasing the risk of salt deposition (Masoudi et al. 2006). An understanding of the effect of salinity and initial liquid satura-tion on chemical treatment helps in design and implementation of wettability alteration. In this study, we report the gas-absolute-permeability and water-effective-permeability data before and after treatment with the fluorinated polymeric surfactants in iso-propanol (IPA) solutions. The cores are saturated initially with different types of brines and other liquids before chemical treatment. Some brines have a detrimental effect on permeability and wettability alteration. In this work, we offer a solution to the problem.

This paper is organized along the following lines. In the Experimental section, we describe the rock materials, fluids, and chemicals. The experimental methods of treatment, core testing (contact angle, imbibition, and fluid flow), and chemical analyses (pH, refractive index, density, viscosity) are then discussed. We present the expressions used in the calculation of flow parameters in the section on Fluid-Flow Tests. In the Results section, the data on contact angle, liquid imbibition, and flow testing are provided. We discuss in detail the effect of salinity on rock wettability in the Discussion section. We also offer a remedy for the adverse effects of salinity. At the end, we draw conclusions.

ExperimentalExperiments are conducted using the Berea and reservoir sandstone cores. Wettability is altered by injecting a chemical solution into the cores and aging at high temperature and pressure. We study the effect of initial rock saturation and the pretreatment process before chemical injection on the alteration of wettability. The effectiveness of chemical treatment is evaluated by measuring contact angle, liq-uid saturation in imbibition tests, gas mobility in single-phase gas flow, and liquid mobility in two-phase gas-liquid flow.

Copyright © 2010 Society of Petroleum Engineers

Original SPE manuscript received for review 5 November 2008. Revised manuscript received for review 25 March 2009. Paper (SPE 122486) peer approved 20 April 2009.

April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering 229

Materials. We describe the materials used in the experiments in three parts: cores, fl uids, and chemicals.

Cores. Berea cores are from Amherst, Ohio (Cleveland Quar-ries), and reservoir cores are from the Middle East. The detailed composition of Berea sandstone is described in Wu and Firoozabadi (2008): ≈93% silica (SiO2), ≈4% alumina (Al2O3) and ≈1% of other metallic oxides (Fe2O3, FeO, MgO, CaO). The reservoir sandstone is taken from a well at ≈4600-m depth; its mineralogy is not available. The Berea cores have a diameter D ≈2.5 cm, and length L ≈15 cm, while the reservoir cores have D ≈3.8 cm, and L ≈4.9 cm. The perme-ability of Berea and reservoir cores is 610–700 md and 0.2–5.0 md, respectively. The porosity of Berea and reservoir cores is ≈0.21 and ≈0.10, respectively. Table 1 lists the relevant data of the cores used in this work, including permeability at 140°C and at high pressure, obtained at three different core states. In State 1, the gas absolute permeability, kg, and water effective permeability, kew, are measured before saturation with other fluids. A small amount of immobile gas is left in the cores in the water-effective-permeability measurements, which is often lower than the gas permeability by a factor of two. For a limited number of cores, we also measure the gas absolute permeability and water effective permeability after the cores have been saturated with brines, but before chemical treatment (State 2). There may be a substantial reduction in gas absolute permeability and water effective permeability from the introduction of certain brines. Third, we measure the gas absolute permeability and water effective permeability of the treated cores (State 3). We provide details of all permeability measurements and discuss the different core states, from the initial saturation and chemical treatment.

Fluids. Air is the gas phase in contact-angle measurements and imbibition testing. Nitrogen is used in the single-phase gas flow and two-phase gas-liquid flow. The fresh water and 1 wt% NaCl(aq) brine are used as the aqueous phase for Berea and reservoir sand-stone, respectively, in contact-angle, imbibition, and gas-liquid-flow measurements. For the oleic phase, normal decane (nC10) is used in contact-angle tests. We have found that there is no substantial differ-ence between an actual condensate and nC10 for the purpose of study-ing wettability alteration. We made the choice of aqueous phases: the “ideal fresh water” for the “ideal model rock” (Berea), while the “closer-to-seawater” brine is used for the “close-to-reality” reservoir sandstone. At 20°C, the specific gravity of water and 1 wt% brine are approximately 1.0, while viscosity is 1 cp for water and 0.97 cp for 1 wt% brine. nC10 has a specific gravity of 0.73 and viscosity of 0.929 cp (Yaws 1999). In the alteration of wettability, several cores are initially saturated with brine before the chemical treatment. We use a variety of salts including NaCl, KCl, and CaCl2 to study the effect of salinity on chemical treatment. Brines of 3 wt% and 0.1 wt% are used to study the effect of salt concentration.

Chemicals. The chemical used in the alteration of wettability is the fluorinated polymeric surfactant “Z8”. The wettability is altered from liquid-wetting to intermediate gas-wetting. As described in Wu and Firoozabadi (2010), the chemical molecules are composed of various functional groups with the ability to adsorb onto the core surface; repel water and oil phases. Water and oil repellency is provided by the fluoro and/or silane group. The ionic and/or silanol groups chemically bond onto the core surface, providing a durable treatment (Tang and Firoozabadi 2002). The ionic or nonionic functional groups make the polymer soluble in the aqueous solution (Linert 1997). The chemical surfactant has the composition of 30 wt% fluoro-polymers in water. It is dissolved in IPA to a dilution of 1 wt% for chemical treatment, which corresponds to the polymer concentration of 0.33 wt%. IPA has a low vapor pressure and can be safe in practical applications. It also reduces the surface tension more effectively than methanol when dissolved in water. IPA has a flash point of 12°C, close to that of methanol (11°C) and ethanol (13°C).

Experimental Methods. The wettability is evaluated by contact angle, spontaneous imbibition, and fl uid fl ow of gas and liquid. The wettabilty is alterted by the chemical treatment at 140°C and 200 psig; the infl ux of the core and the effl ux from treatment are analyzed.

Contact Angle. We use a pipette to place a liquid drop on the surface of the air-saturated core at approximately 23°C. The con-figuration of a sessile liquid drop on the core surface in the ambi-ent air is magnified on a monitor screen. We take snapshots of the drop image by a digital camera under proper illumination of a light source. The contact angle is measured through the liquid phase using the goniometry tool of the software Image-Pro®. In Berea, a liquid drop of water and nC10 imbibe instantly into the liquid-wet-ting untreated core, indicating a contact angle of approximately 0°. Owing to the alteration of wettability in Berea, the water contact angle, �w, increases to 110–140° and the nC10 contact angle, �o, increases to 45–80° at the inlet face of the treated core.

Spontaneous-Imbibition Test. The spontaneous-imbibition test is described by Wu and Firoozabadi (2010), and Tang and Firooz-abadi (2002).

Fluid-Flow Test. We conduct fluid-flow tests to evaluate the effect of wettability alteration. Fig. 1 shows the setup used in this work. We apply an overburden pressure of 1,000 psig (6.9×106 Pa) by a syringe pump. The temperature of the system is maintained in an oven. Compressed nitrogen from a cylinder flows through the pressure regulator, and the liquid is injected from the inlet pump. The inlet pressure and pressure drop are measured by a pressure trans-ducer and a demodulator, with accuracy of 0.2 psia (1.4 kPa). We use a back pressure regulator to adjust the pressure drop while mea-suring the gas-flow rate by a flowmeter in the range of 1–80 cm3/s

TABLE 1—RELEVANT DATA OF THE CORES*

kg (md) kew (md)

Core Type Core ID D [cm] L [cm] W [g] φ 1 2 3 1 2 3

B26 2.47 14.20 139.33 0.208 618 – 631 215 – 331 B27 2.47 15.09 148.50 0.207 661 – 531 285 – 311 B28 2.47 15.03 147.88 0.210 700 – 591 260 – 297 B33 2.47 15.11 148.54 0.207 686 – 603 278 – 339 B34 2.47 14.51 142.03 0.213 700 – 592 290 – 320 B35 2.46 15.21 146.47 0.214 660 – 608 264 – 362 B42 2.48 14.94 148.00 0.212 670 282 274 305 107 190 B43 2.47 14.87 146.38 0.212 695 – 631 318 349 464

Berea

B44 2.45 14.65 141.84 0.212 725 409 – 295 151 – R6 3.82 4.90 131.05 0.106 4.99 – 4.11 2.32 – 2.83 R7 3.82 4.90 134.08 0.090 1.34 – 0.55 0.59 – 0.22 R8 3.67 4.88 121.30 0.095 0.41 – 0.34 0.20 – 0.23

Reservoir

R9 3.69 5.06 126.16 0.107 0.24 0.18 0.19 0.08 0.04 0.07 * Permeability is measured at 140°C, (1) before saturation with brine and water, (2) after saturation with brine and water, and before chemical treatment (Cores B42,

B43, B44, and R9), and (3) after chemical treatment.

230 April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering

(accuracy approximately 0.5%). The liquid-flow rate is fixed by the inlet pump while maintaining the outlet pressure by the receiver pump. In single-phase gas flow, the inlet and outlet pressures at various gas-flow rates are recorded. In two-phase flow when liquid displaces gas, the liquid is injected at a fixed flow rate into the gas-saturated core. The pressure drop is recorded.

Chemical Treatment. The wettability of the core is altered by chemical treatment at 140°C and 200 psig (1.5×106 Pa). The experimental setup for treatment is similar to that used in the fluid-flow test. Five pore volumes (PV) of the chemical solution is injected in the core at various treatment conditions, followed by overnight aging of approximately 15 hours. Approximately 20 PV of fresh water (for Berea) and 1 wt% NaCl(aq) brine (for reser-voir core) is then injected to displace the chemical solution and to wash the core. The injection of chemical solution or washing with water/brine is carried out at a rate of 4 cm3/min in Berea and 0.2–2 cm3/min in reservoir core. Then, we inject nitrogen (approxi-mately 30 PV) to drain the liquids from the core at Q ≈10 cm3/min in both Berea and reservoir core. The purpose of water/brine wash-ing (post-treatment) is to test the durability of chemical treatment at high temperature through examination of contact angle.

We study the effect of treatment conditions on wettability alter-ation. The term “treatment condition” refers to the state of cores before chemical injection. As shown in Table 2, the treatment con-dition is varied by a combination of initial saturation and pretreat-ment. The core is initially saturated with nitrogen or water or brine, before chemical treatment. To avoid the adverse effect of initial saturation by brine on the effectiveness of wettability alteration, we suggest the following pretreatment process. Approximately 32 PV of water (for Berea) and approximately 45 PV (for reservoir core) is injected to displace the brine, followed by nitrogen injection to drain the water. After permeability measurement by fluid-flow test in the untreated core, the chemical is injected. This treatment condition is designated as “brine+H2O+N2,” which includes the initial saturation with “brine” and pretreatment of “H2O+N2.” As shown in Table 2, the treatment condition of “N2+IPA” refers to the initial saturation with “N2” and pretreatment with “5 PV IPA”; the treatment condition of “3% NaCl(aq)” brine refers to the ini-tial saturation with “3% NaCl(aq)” brine without pretreatment; the treatment condition of “3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2” refers to the initial saturation with “3 wt% NaCl(aq)” brine and pretreatment process of “H2O+N2.”

(inlet)

Core holder

Core

(outlet)

Fig. 1—Experimental setup for fluid-flow test and chemical treatment.

TABLE 2—TREATMENT CONDITIONS OF THE CORES

Core Type Core ID Initial Saturation Pretreatment Treatment Condition ID

B26 N2 None N2 B27 H2O None H2O B28 3 wt% NaCl(aq) None 3% NaCl(aq) B33 3 wt% KCl(aq) None 3% KCl(aq) B34 3 wt% CaCl2(aq) None 3% CaCl2 (aq) B35 N2 5 PV IPA N2+IPA B42 3 wt% NaCl(aq) H2O+N2 3% NaCl(aq)+ H2O+N2 B43 3 wt% CaCl2(aq) H2O+N2 3% CaCl2 (aq)+ H2O+N2

Berea

B44 3 wt% NaCl(aq) H2O+N2 3% NaCl(aq)+ H2O+N2 R6 N2 None N2 R7 3 wt% NaCl(aq) None 3% NaCl(aq) R8 0.1 wt% NaCl(aq) None 0.1% NaCl(aq)

Reservoir

R9 3 wt% NaCl(aq) H2O+N2 3% NaCl(aq)+ H2O+N2

April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering 231

Analysis of Chemical Solutions. Qualitative and quantitative analytical methods are applied to compare the influx and efflux from the core. We observe a color change in both the treated cores and the solutions after treatment. The pH of chemical solutions is measured by the pH meter, which has automatic temperature compensation. The reproducibility of the pH measurements for the aqueous solution is approximately 0.02 units. Because of the low dissociation of chemical to form H+ ion in the IPA solution, the pH reading of chemical in IPA solutions has fluctuations (errors) of approximately 0.5. The refractive index, density and viscosity of chemical solutions are measured by refractometer (accuracy = 0.0003), pycometer (specific-gravity bottle of 25 cm3), and viscom-eter (capillary of size 0B which measures viscosity in the range of 1-5 cSt), respectively.

According to the Derjaguin-Landau-Verwey-Overbeek (DLVO) theory of colloidal stability (Derjaguin and Landau 1941; Verwey and Overbeek 1948), the added electrolyte in chemical solutions could destroy the double layer of colloidal particles and induce coagulation. In order to test the stability of chemical solutions that contact the initial saturated core with brine during treatment, we conducted a stability test by mixing the chemical solution with brine in a vial of approximately 30 cm3 for a weight ratio of approximately 1:1. After shaking the vial vigorously for approximately 10 seconds, the mixture is put at rest. The phases in the mixture are monitored for 2 days. The concentration of chemical solutions and brine in the mixture is varied to evaluate the critical point of stability.

Fluid-Flow TestsWe examine flow in a core by means of single-phase gas flow and two-phase liquid displacing the gas phase. The flow parameters of porous media with respect to different fluids are calculated. Applying the Forchheimer equation in the steady-state gas flow, we measure the absolute permeability and high-velocity coefficient. In the unsteady-state gas-liquid flow with gas displaced by liquid injection, the effective and relative permeabilities of liquid are calculated at the final steady state using the Darcy expression. We quantify the efficiency of wettability alteration from the change of fluid-flow parameters from chemical treatment.

High-Velocity Gas Flow. We calculate the absolute permeability and high-velocity coeffi cient from gas-fl ow measurements using the Forchheimer equation (Forchheimer 1901):

M p p

ZRTLj

j

kg

g g

g

g g

12

22

2

1−( )= +

��

�, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (1)

where p1 and p2 are the inlet and outlet pressure, respectively; Mg, �g, and jg are molecular weight, viscosity, and mass flux of the gas, respectively; R and Z are the gas constant and the gas deviation factor, respectively; T is temperature; and L is the core length. The absolute permeability, kg, and high-velocity coefficient, �, are determined from the intercept and slope, respectively, in the plot of M p p ZRTLjg g g1

222 2−( ) ( )� vs. jg g� .

We quantify the effect of chemical treatment by calculating the change of absolute permeability and high-velocity coefficient:

�k

k

k k

kg

g

g g

g

≡−(treated core) (untreated core)

((untreated core), . . . . . . . . . . . . (2a)

��

�

� �

�≡ −(treated core) (untreated core)

(untreeated core). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (2b)

Liquid Flow. The liquid injection in a gas-saturated core is a tran-sient two-phase gas-liquid-fl ow test in which the gas in the core is displaced by the liquid. In the late stage of liquid injection, we apply Darcy’s law to the quasisteady state,

�p Qk

L

Al

el

= �, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (3)

to describe the pressure drop, �p, as a function of the liquid vol-ume flow rate, Q, with the parameters of liquid viscosity, �l, core length, L, cross-section area, A, and the liquid effective perme-ability, kel. When the pressure drop reaches steady state, there is less than 10% gas in the core. The liquid effective permeability is calculated then, when the core is >90% saturated with liquid. We calculate the liquid relative permeability krl (ratio of liquid effective permeability to the absolute permeability obtained from single-phase gas flow):

kk

krlel

g

= . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (4)

We quantify the effectiveness of chemical treatment in liquid flow by calculating the change of liquid effective and relative perme-ability from:

�k

k

k kel

el

el el≡ −(treated core) (untreated coree)

(untreated core)kel

, . . . . . . . . . . . . (5a)

�k

k

k krl

rl

rl rl≡ −(treated core) (untreated coree)

(untreated core)krl

. . . . . . . . . . . . . (5b)

ResultsThe goal of chemical treatment is to alter the wettability from liquid-wetting to intermediate gas-wetting. The evaluation is made by four tests: (1) contact angle, (2) imbibition, (3) gas flow, and (4) liquid injection. In addition, we examine the liquid solutions from influx and efflux to advance our understanding of various treatment conditions. The results of the preceding four wettability evaluation tests are interrelated; all depend on the rock’s wettability. However, their results do not solely depend on each other.

Analysis of Chemical Solutions. We conduct measurements of pH, refractive index, density, and viscosity to compare the chemical infl ux with effl ux. We also observe the color change of the cores and chemical solutions caused by treatment. The treated cores have brown spots appearing on the surface, which are most probably caused by the iron oxides (hematite) converted from various iron-rich cements in the Berea (consisting of iron sulfi des, siderite, and ferroan dolomite) when the core is kept at 140°C overnight during chemical aging (Shaw et al. 1991). As we will see later, the brown spots are not directly related to the permeability reduction, since in Core B26 the permeability increases from treatment. We also observe similar brown spots on core treated only with IPA. Fig. 2 shows the 1 wt% chemical Z8 solution before and after treatment in Berea (Fig. 2a) and reservoir core (Fig. 2b) initially saturated with nitrogen. The chemical in IPA solution is transparent before treat-ment (left bottles) and changes to the amber color after treatment (right bottles) in Berea and reservoir core. The same chemical color change is observed in Wu and Firoozabadi (2010) where the reaction between rocks and chemicals is studied by analyzing liquid streams through GCMS and ICPMS analysis. Comparison of the composi-tion in chemical infl ux and effl ux shows that the trace amount of materials dissolved from the cores or produced in rock chemical reaction consists of Eicosane and Dibutyl sebcate from Berea and stearyl amine and tetradecane from the reservoir sandstone. Those effl ux chemicals may be the cause for the color change. The amber color is deeper in the treated reservoir core than the treated Berea. We inject 5 PV of chemical solution for treatment in both Berea and reservoir core. Given that 1 PV in Berea core is ≈15 cm3, which is three times the PV of a reservoir core, the concentration is higher in the effl ux from the reservoir core. We observe a similar color change in the effl uent from IPA treatment.

The changes in pH, refractive index, density, and viscosity from influx to efflux at various treatment conditions are compared in Figs. 3 and 4 in Berea and reservoir cores, respectively. The efflux is a mixture of influx and the fluid in the initial saturation. The efflux from initial saturation with water (B27), brine (B28,

232 April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering

(b) (a)

Fig. 2—Change of color from chemical treatment in (a) Berea B26 and (b) reservoir Core R6. Cores are initially saturated with nitrogen.

0.00

0.04

0.08

0.12

B26

, N2

B42

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

+H2O

+N2

B43

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)+H

2O+N

2

B35

,N

2+IP

A

B27

, H2O

B28

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

B33

, 3%

KC

l(aq)

B34

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)

Treatment condition

Cha

nge

of d

ensi

tyΔ

ρ,

g/cm

3

(c)

0.000.501.001.50

B26

, N2

B42

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

+H2O

+N2

B43

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)+H

2O+N

2

B35

,N

2+IP

A

B27

, H2O

B28

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

B33

, 3%

KC

l(aq)

B34

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)

Treatment condition

Cha

nge

of v

isco

sity

Δμ

, cp

(d)

–0.008

–0.006

–0.004

–0.002

0.000

0.002

B26

, N2

B42

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

+H2O

+N2

B43

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)+H

2O+N

2

B35

,N

2+IP

A

B27

, H2O

B28

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

B33

, 3%

KC

l(aq)

B34

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)

Treatment condition

Cha

nge

of re

fract

ive

inde

x Δ

nD

–0.80

–0.60

–0.40

–0.20

0.00

B26

, N2

B42

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

+H2O

+N2

B43

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)+H

2O+N

2

B35

,N

2+IP

A

B27

, H2O

B28

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

B33

, 3%

KC

l(aq)

B34

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)

Treatment condition

Cha

nge

of p

H

(a)

(b)

Fig. 3—Changes of (a) pH, (b) refractive index, (c) density, and (d) viscosity of efflux/influx from chemical treatment in Berea cores at various treatment conditions.

April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering 233

B33, B34, R7, R8), and IPA (B35) is a mixture with volume ratio of approximately 2:1 of injected chemical and saturation liquid (when the dead volume of tubing of flow system is considered). The chemical efflux collected from the reservoir core is less than 15 cm3 (after deduction of the dead volume in tubing), which is not enough for the viscosity measurement. In most cases, the efflux of chemical and IPA mixed with the aqueous phase in the saturated core (B27, B28, B33, B34, R7, R8) has lower pH and refractive index and higher density and viscosity than the original chemical solution and IPA. The tendency of chemical dissociation to form H+ ion in water causes lower pH for the aqueous mixture. The lower refractive index and higher density for the efflux containing water or brine result from properties of water (nD20 = 1.333, �20 = 0.998 g/cm3), 3 wt% brine (nD20 = 1.338, �20 = 1.003 g/cm3), IPA (nD20 = 1.377, �20 = 0.781 g/cm3) and 1 wt% chemical in IPA (nD20 = 1.378, �20 = 0.788 g/cm3). The viscosity of IPA, �20 = 2.37 cp, is higher than that of water, �20 = 1.00 cp. However, the mixture of chemical, IPA, and water has a higher viscosity than the chemical and IPA solution; this is probably caused by the emulsion state in the efflux from treatment.

We have examined the stability of the mixture of chemical solution and brine at ambient temperature of approximately 23°C.

Eight g of chemical solution is mixed with approximately 8 g of brine in a vial of approximately 30-cm3 volume. The dependence of the mixture stability on salt concentration is studied in three groups of mixtures. The first group is a mixture of 1 wt% chemical Z8 and NaCl(aq) brine at 1, 3, and 10 wt%. Figs. 5a and 5b show the mixtures at 15 minutes and 5 hours after shaking, respectively. Only the mixture of 1 wt% chemical Z8 + 10 wt% NaCl(aq) brine forms spot/gel-like coagulant on the surface of the vial (the third on the right in Fig. 5b); the others are clear solutions. The second group is a mixture of 20 wt% NaCl(aq) brine and chemical Z8 at 0.25, 0.5, and 1 wt%. Figs. 5c and 5d show the mixtures before shaking and 30 seconds after shaking, respectively. All three bottles have phase separation before shaking and have coagulant sedimentation at 30 seconds after shaking. The third group is a mixture of 10 wt% NaCl(aq) brine and chemical Z8 at 0.25, 0.5, and 1 wt%. Figs. 5e and 5f show the mixtures at 3 seconds and 24 hours after shaking, respectively. The foam and bubbles seen at 3 seconds after shaking are formed by mixing with the air inside. Twenty-four hours after the air escapes, the mixture transforms to a transparent solution, except the mixture of 10 wt% NaCl(aq) brine + 1 wt% chemical Z8, which forms a somewhat foam/gel-like coagulant on the air/solution interface (the third vial on the

0.00

0.04

0.08

0.12

0.16

R6, N2 R9, 3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2

R8, 0.1% NaCl(aq) R7, 3% NaCl(aq)

Treatment condition

Cha

nge

of d

ensi

ty Δ

ρ,

g/cm

3

(c)

–0.60

–0.40

–0.20

0.00

0.20

0.40

Cha

nge

of p

H

–0.015

–0.010

–0.005

0.000

0.005

R6, N2 R9, 3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2

R8, 0.1% NaCl(aq) R7, 3% NaCl(aq)

Treatment condition

R6, N2 R9, 3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2

R8, 0.1% NaCl(aq) R7, 3% NaCl(aq)

Treatment condition

Cha

nge

of re

fract

ive

inde

x Δ

nD

(a)

(b)

Fig. 4—Changes of (a) pH, (b) refractive index, and (c) density of efflux/influx from chemical treatment in reservoir cores at various treatment conditions.

234 April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering

right in Fig. 5f). From the preceding measurements, we conclude that there is a concentration safety zone for the stability of treat-ment-chemical/brine mixtures. The coagulation occurs faster at higher concentration of either chemical or brine. The critical concentration for the stability in the chemical/brine mixture (mix-ing weight ratio of approximately 1:1) is 1 wt% chemical Z8 + 10 wt% NaCl(aq) brine. In the elevated temperature and pressure typi-cal of petroleum reservoirs, there should be higher solubility and wider stability range of concentrations. We confirm in our stability tests that the mixtures of 1 wt% chemical Z8 and 3 wt% NaCl(aq) brine used in our treatment condition do not coagulate.

Contact Angle. We evaluate the effi ciency of wettability alteration by measuring the air/liquid/rock contact angle at room temperature from treatment. A liquid drop of nC10 imbibes into the untreated Berea and reservoir core immediately after being placed onto the core surface. Water imbibes into untreated Berea but the brine forms a drop on the untreated reservoir core. We use 1 wt% NaCl(aq) brine instead of water in the contact-angle test for the reservoir core, the same as the other tests. The snapshots of liquid drops on untreated

and treated Berea and reservoir core are shown in Fig. 6. Here both types of core are treated with 1 wt% chemical Z8 at the treatment condition of “N2.” There is a contact-angle increase (measured through the liquid phase) in treated cores (Berea and reservoir rock) and for all the liquids (water, brine, and nC10). The contact angle increase for water and brine is much higher than that for nC10.

To evaluate the homogeneity of chemical treatment throughout the core, we compare the contact angle at different positions on the core surface—at the inlet, outlet, and the core sides close to the inlet, outlet, and middle. The contact-angle changes from treatment in Berea/reservoir core are plotted for various treatment conditions in Figs. 7 and 8 for water/brine and nC10, respectively. The error of the measured contact angle is approximately 5°. As shown in Fig. 7a, the treated Berea has uniform water-contact-angle increase of 110–140° all over the core surface for the treatment condition of “N2” (B26), “H2O” (B27), and “3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2” (B42). For the rest, the water contact angle decreases and there is imbibition toward the outlet, which indicates inefficient treatment. The con-tact angle of Core B43 with the treatment condition of “3% CaCl2 (aq)+H2O+N2” is not homogeneous. This is not the case for Core

(a) (b)

(c) (d)

(e) (f)

Fig. 5—Stability of mixtures of treatment chemical and brine for various concentrations. Mixtures of 1 wt% treatment chemical Z8 and NaCl(aq) brine of 1, 3, and 10 wt% (a) 15 minutes and (b) 5 hours after shaking. Mixtures of 20 wt% NaCl(aq) brine and treatment chemical Z8 of 0.25, 0.5, and 1 wt% (c) before shaking and (d) 30 seconds after shaking. Mixtures of 10 wt% NaCl(aq) brine and treatment chemical Z8 of 0.25, 0.5, and 1 wt% (e) 3 seconds and (f) 24 hours after shaking.

April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering 235

Air 1 wt%

NaCl(aq)

nC10

θw =135° θnC10=45°

Treated

reservoir core

Air 1 wt%

NaCl(aq)

nC10

θw =70° θnC10=1°

Untreated

reservoir core

Air Water nC10

Treated

Berea

θw =120° θnC10=45°

Untreated

Berea

Air Water nC10

θw =0° θnC10=0°

(a) (b)

(c) (d)

Fig. 6—Contact angle of water and nC10 in the inlet face in Berea Core B26 (a) before and (b) after treatment; 1 wt% NaCl(aq) brine and nC10 at the inlet face in reservoir Core R6 (c) before and (d) after treatment.

0

20

40

60

80

100

Inlet Side-middle Outlet

Position in reservoir core

Brin

e co

ntac

t ang

lech

ange

Δθw

, deg

ree

R6, N2 R8, 0.1% NaCl(aq)

R7, 3% NaCl(aq) R9, 3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2

(b)

(a)

020406080

100120140

Inlet Side-inlet Side-middle Side-outlet OutletPosition in Berea core

Wat

er c

onta

ct a

ngle

chan

ge Δ

θw, d

egre

e

B26, N2 B42, 3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2B43, 3% CaCl2(aq)+H2O+N2 B35, N2+IPAB27, H2O B28, 3% NaCl(aq)B33, 3% KCl(aq) B34, 3% CaCl2(aq)

Fig. 7—Change of contact angle of (a) water in treated Berea cores and of (b) 1wt% NaCl(aq) brine in treated reservoir cores at various treatment conditions.

236 April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering

B42 with the treatment condition of “3% NaCl2(aq)+H2O+N2”. The difference may be because of the type of salt—CaCl2 vs. NaCl. We also observe different effect of CaCl2 and NaCl on fluid flow, which will be described in the section Water Displacement of Gas Phase. The difference between Ca2+ and Na+ is explained by Kia et al. (1987) as different double-layer interactions between clay surface and pore walls. The release of clay in the treatment condi-tion of “3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2” may clear more adsorption sites on silica for the chemical for more effective treatment than the “3% CaCl2(aq)+H2O+N2”. The outside core surface is in contact with the core-holder distribution plug (core end) and sleeve (core side) during the flow testing and chemical treatment. We have cut some cores into pieces to examine the contact angle inside (inner surface) and to compare with measurements at core outside surface. In the treated Core B28 at treatment condition of “3% NaCl(aq)”, water imbibes along the cross sections at the distance of 1/3 L and 2/3 L from the inlet, similar to the observation on the outside surface.

The contact angle of untreated reservoir cores is not homo-geneous; there is variation between inlet, side-middle, and outlet positions, which may contribute partially to the inhomogeneity of contact-angle change from treatment shown in Fig. 7b. The nC10

contact angle increases to 45–80° at the inlet of the treated Berea and imbibes at all other positions (Fig. 8a). The treated reservoir core has higher nC10 contact-angle increase at the inlet and outlet than at the side-middle position (Fig. 8b). The chemical treatment in the more-permeable Berea core is more effective than in the less-permeable reservoir core, based on the contact-angle measurement of water/brine and nC10.

Spontaneous Imbibition. Fig. 9a shows water-imbibition mea-surements (T = 20°C) in untreated and treated Berea at various treatment conditions. We show the imbibition data only for the untreated Berea B26 because water imbibition varies less than 3.5% in all untreated Berea cores where much of imbibition occurs in the fi rst 10 min. The treated Berea has much lower water imbibition. The water-imbibition rate in the treated cores varies with the treatment condition of initial saturation. The core at the

(b)

0102030405060

Inlet Side-middle OutletPosition in reservoir core

nC10

con

tact

ang

lech

ange

Δθo

, deg

ree

R6, N2 R9, 3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2R8, 0.1% NaCl(aq) R7, 3% NaCl(aq)

(a)

0

20

40

60

80

100

Inlet Side-inlet Side-middle Side-outlet OutletPosition in Berea core

nC10

con

tact

ang

lech

ange

Δθo

, deg

ree

B26, N2 B42, 3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2B43, 3% CaCl2(aq)+H2O+N2 B35, N2+IPAB27, H2O B28, 3% NaCl(aq)B33, 3% KCl(aq) B34, 3% CaCl2(aq)

Fig. 8—Change of nC10 contact angle of treated cores in (a) Berea and (b) reservoir core at various treatment conditions.

treatment condition of “N2” has less imbibition than the others. To alleviate the adverse effect of initial saturation by brine on treat-ment, we apply the pretreatment process by displacing initially saturating brine by water, followed by nitrogen drain (i.e., the treatment condition of “brine+H2O+N2”). Fig. 9b shows the effect of pretreatment. The imbibition in the treated core at the treatment condition of “brine+H2O+N2” (B42, B43) is lower than with the treatment condition of “brine” (B28, B34). Fig. 9c compares the change of fi nal water saturation in imbibition for various condi-tions. The order of reduction in the fi nal water saturation is: N2 > N2+IPA > 3% CaCl2(aq)+H2O+N2 > H2O > 3% CaCl2(aq) > 3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2 > 3% NaCl(aq) > 3% KCl(aq). The low water imbibition at treatment condition of “N2” and “H2O” is related to a homogeneous contact angle throughout the treated core surface (Fig. 7a). The treatment decreases the water imbibitions by 67% for treatment condition of “N2,” and by only 4% for that of “3% KCl(aq).”

Fig. 10a shows imbibition of 1 wt% NaCl(aq) brine in the untreated and treated reservoir cores at various treatment condi-tions. Imbibition in the untreated reservoir cores varies from core to core. The final brine imbibition in the untreated reservoir cores (approximately 50%) is lower than the final water imbibition in untreated Berea (approximately 60%). The imbibition in treated reservoir cores reduces to a lesser extent than that in the treated Berea at the same treatment condition. We show the change in final brine saturation in imbibition for the reservoir cores in Fig. 10b. Compared with cores at treatment condition of “N2” (R6) and “0.1% NaCl(aq) brine” (R8), the core at treatment condition of “3% NaCl(aq) brine” (R7) shows an adverse effect. The pretreatment process “H2O+N2” in the treatment condition of “3% NaCl(aq) brine+H2O+N2” (R9) remedies the salt effect and enhances the reduction of final brine saturation. Compared with Berea treatment, the pretreatment process is especially effective in wettability altera-tion of the reservoir cores with initial saturation of 3 wt% NaCl(aq) brine. The chemical treatment reduces imbibition of water and brine in Berea and reservoir cores, which indicates the alteration of wettability to less water-wetting and more gas-wetting.

April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering 237

High-Velocity Gas Flow. The pressure drop in gas fl ow is stud-ied using the Forchheimer expression in Eq. 1. In our measure-ments, the pressure drop, �p = p1−p2, and the average pressure, p p p= +( )1 2 2/ across the Berea core are �p ≈ 23 psia (1.6×105

Pa), p ≈ 56 psia (3.9×105 Pa); the values for reservoir cores at 140°C are �p ≈ 284 psia (2.0×106 Pa), p ≈ 160 psia (1.1×106 Pa). The changes in absolute permeability (Eq. 2a) and high-velocity coeffi cient (Eq. 2b) in the treated Berea at various treatment con-ditions are presented in Figs. 11a and 11b, respectively. In most cases, there is a reduction of absolute permeability from treatment that is less than 20%. The pore-structure change may lead to the change of gas absolute permeability. As described before, the treatment may convert the iron-rich cements in sandstone into iron oxides, shown as the brown spots on the core surface. The porosity

has a negligible change after treatment. There is less permeability reduction from the treatment condition of “brine+H2O+N2” (B42 and B43) than from the treatment condition of “brine” (B27 and B28). The pretreatment “H2O+N2,” by displacing the initial satura-tion with water followed by nitrogen drainage, mitigates the per-meability reduction. The high-velocity coeffi cient in treated Berea changes from −20 to 70%. There is an approximately 20% decrease of high-velocity coeffi cient for the treatment conditions of “3% KCl(aq) brine,” and an increase >20% for treatment conditions of “H2O”, “N2+IPA,” “3% NaCl(aq) brine,” and “3% CaCl2(aq) brine+H2O+N2.” The high-velocity coeffi cient of the other cores changes <20%, which is in the error range of the measurements.

There is a reduction of high-velocity coefficient in Core B26 treated at condition of “N2” and a slight increase in permeability.

(c)

–80–60–40–20

0

B26

, N2

B35

,N

2+IP

A

B27

, H2O

B34

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)

B28

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

B33

, 3%

KC

l(aq)

B43

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)+H

2O+N

2

B42

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

+H2O

+N2

Treatment condition

Cha

nge

of fi

nal w

ater

sa

tura

tion

ΔS

w/S

w, %

010203040506070

0 30 60 90 120 150 180 210 240

Time, min

Wat

er s

atur

atio

n S

w, %

B26-Untreated B28-Treated, "3% NaCl(aq)"B42-Treated, "3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2" B34-Treated, "3% CaCl2(aq)"B43-Treated, "3% CaCl2(aq)+H2O+N2"

(b)

Zonyl 8740: IC effect

010203040506070

0 30 60 90 120 150 180 210 240Time, min

Wat

er s

atur

atio

n S

w, %

B26-Untreated B26-Treated, "N2"B27-Treated, "H2O" B28-Treated, "3% NaCl(aq)"B33-Treated, "3% KCl(aq)" B34-Treated, "3% CaCl2(aq)"B35-Treated, "N2+IPA"

(a)

Fig. 9—Water imbibition vs. time in untreated and treated Berea cores (a) at various treatment conditions; (b) effect of pretreat-ment process “H2O+N2.” (c) Change of final water saturation in imbibition test.

238 April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering

As a result, the treatment condition of “N2” performs better than the treatment condition of “brine+H2O+N2” in single-phase gas flow. However, in the two-phase water-injection test (to be discussed in the section Water Displacement of Gas Phase) the treatment con-dition of “brine+H2O+N2” has a larger increase in water effective permeability than the treatment condition of “N2.” We place the most weight on the the results of two-phase water-injection test in treatment evaluation. The three tests of contact angle, imbibitions, and gas flow also provide important information on the effect of chemical treatment.

The results for high-velocity gas flow in the reservoir cores at 140°C are shown in Fig. 12 for the change of absolute permeabil-ity and high-velocity coefficient at various treatment conditions. The treatment condition of “3 % NaCl(aq) brine” greatly reduces the permeability and increases the high-velocity coefficient. In contrast, there is an increase in permeability and a decrease in the high-velocity coefficient at the treatment of “3% NaCl(aq) brine+H2O+N2.” The pretreatment process “H2O+N2” eliminates the adverse effect of salinity.

Water Displacement of Gas Phase. Water is injected into the nitrogen-saturated Berea cores at a fi xed fl ow rate of 6 cm3/min, while the 1 wt% NaCl(aq) brine is injected at a rate of 0.2–2 cm3/min in the reservoir cores. The temperature and outlet pressure are maintained at 140°C and 200 psig (1.5×106 Pa), respectively. The pressure drop across the untreated and treated core is monitored.

Fig. 13a shows the results for untreated and treated Berea cores at various treatment conditions. The pressure drop increases in early time as expected; a maximum is reached at approximately 1 PV for most cases. Afterward, the pressure drop decreases gradually to a near-constant value at steady state. The trend in the pressure-drop plots is distinct in the untreated and treated cores. The chemical treatment reduces the pressure drop and, therefore, increases the water effective permeability. The treated cores have a signifi cantly lower pressure drop during the early period of water injection. At the fi nal stage of injection, the liquid saturation reaches a maximum >90%, estimated from the core weight gain at test termination.

To eliminate the adverse effect of salt (ions) on treatment effec-tiveness, we suggest the pretreatment process for the cores initially saturated with brine. We inject water in the core to displace the initially saturated brine, followed by nitrogen injection to drain the water. After measuring the absolute permeability and water effective permeability of the untreated core, the chemical is then injected for treatment. The results of water injection in nitrogen-saturated Berea before and after chemical treatment are shown in Fig. 13b for those cores with pretreatment process (Cores B42 and B43). Fig. 14 shows the results of 1 wt% NaCl(aq) brine injec-tion in untreated and treated reservoir cores. The pressure drop in treated cores reduces significantly in the treatment condition of “3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2.” The injection rate in reservoir cores var-ies from 0.2 cm3/min for Core R9 with kg = 0.2 md to 2 cm3/min for

–15

–10

–50

510

R6, N2 R8, 0.1% NaCl(aq) R7, 3% NaCl(aq)R9, 3% NaCl(aq)

+H2O+N2

Treatment condition

Cha

nge

of fi

nal b

rine

satu

ratio

n Δ

Sw

/Sw

, %

(b)

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

0 60 120 180 240 300 360 420 480Time, min

Brin

e sa

tura

tion

Sw

, %

R6-Untreated R6-Treated, "N2"

R8-Untreated R8-Treated, "0.1 % NaCl(aq)"

R9-Untreated R9-Treated, "3 % NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2"

(a)

Fig. 10—(a) Brine imbibition vs. time in untreated and treated reservoir cores at various treatment conditions. (b) Change of finial brine saturation in imbibition test.

April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering 239

(b)

–30–20–10

010203040506070

B26

, N2

B42

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

+H2O

+N2

B43

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)+H

2O+N

2

B35

,N

2+IP

A

B33

, 3%

KC

l(aq)

B34

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)

B28

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

B27

, H2O

Treatment condition

Hig

h ve

loci

ty c

oeffi

cien

t cha

nge

Δβ

/β, %

(a)

–20

–15

–10

–5

0

5

B26

, N2

B42

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

+H2O

+N2

B43

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)+H

2O+N

2

B35

,N

2+IP

A

B33

, 3%

KC

l(aq)

B34

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)

B28

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

B27

, H2O

Treatment condition

Abs

olut

e pe

rmea

bilit

y ch

ange

Δkg/k

g, %

Fig. 11—Change of (a) absolute permeability and (b) high-velocity coefficient in treated Berea cores at various treatment conditions.

–60

–40

–20

0

20R6, N2 R8, 0.1% NaCl(aq) R7, 3% NaCl(aq)

R9, 3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2

Treatment condition

Abso

lute

per

mea

bilit

ych

ange

Δk g

/kg %

–1000

100200300400500600700

R6, N2 R8, 0.1% NaCl(aq) R7, 3% NaCl(aq) R9, 3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2

Treatment condition

Hig

h ve

loci

ty c

oeffi

cien

tch

ange

Δβ/

β, %

(a)

(b)

Fig. 12—Change of (a) absolute permeability and (b) high-velocity coefficient in treated reservoir cores at various treatment conditions.

240 April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering

(b)

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35Time, PV

Pre

ssur

e dr

op, p

si

B42-Untreated

B42-Treated, "3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2"

B43-Untreated

B43-Treated, "3% CaCl2(aq)+H2O+N2"

(a)

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35Time, PV

Pre

ssur

e dr

op, p

si

B26-UntreatedB26-Treated, "N2"B27-UntreatedB27-Treated, "H2O"B28-UntreatedB28-Treated, "3% NaCl(aq)""B33-UntreatedB33-Treated, "3% KCl(aq)"B34-UntreatedB34-Treated, "3% CaCl2(aq)"B35-UntreatedB35-Treated, "N2+IPA"

Fig. 13—Pressure drop vs. PV water injection in untreated and treated Berea cores (a) at various treatment conditions; (b) effect of pretreatment process “H2O+N2” (Q = 6 cm3/min).

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

450

500

0 10 20 30 40 50 60Time, PV

Pre

ssur

e dr

op, p

si

R6-UntreatedR6-Treated, "N2"R8-UntreatedR8-Treated, "0.1% NaCl(aq)"R9-UntreatedR9-Treated, "3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2" Q=0.2 cm3/min

Q=1 cm3/min

Q=2 cm3/min

Fig. 14—Pressure drop vs. PV brine injection in untreated and treated reservoir cores at various treatment conditions; Q = 2 cm3/min for Core R6, Q = 1 cm3/min for Core R8, Q = 0.2 cm3/min for Core R9.

April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering 241

Core R6 with kg = 5 md. The treatment in Berea has larger effect on pressure drop in the two-phase-flow region (transient period) than the treatment in the reservoir cores.

The treatment effectiveness is evaluated by calculating the changes in the effective permeability, �kew/kew (Eq. 5a), and in

relative permeability, �krw/krw (Eq. 5b). The results for various treatment conditions are depicted in Figs. 15 and 16 for Berea and the reservoir cores, respectively. The treatment condition “brine+H2O+N2” increases �kew/kew and �krw/krw (i.e., the pretreat-ment process “H2O+N2” remedies the adverse effect of salt). The

(b)

0

20

40

60

80

100

B42

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

+H2O

+N2

B43

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)+H

2O+N

2

B26

, N2

B35

,N

2+IP

A

B33

, 3%

KC

l(aq)

B28

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

B34

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)

B27

, H2O

Treatment condition

Rel

ativ

e w

ater

perm

eabi

lity

chan

ge Δ

krw/k

rw, %

0

20

40

60

80

B42

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

+H2O

+N2

B43

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)+H

2O+N

2

B26

, N2

B35

,N

2+IP

A

B33

, 3%

KC

l(aq)

B28

, 3%

NaC

l(aq)

B34

, 3%

CaC

l2(a

q)

B27

, H2O

Treatment condition

Effe

ctiv

e w

ater

perm

eabi

lity

chan

ge Δ

k ew/k

ew, %

(a)

Fig. 15—Change of (a) water effective permeability and (b) water relative permeability in treated Berea core at various treatment conditions.

–20

0

20

40

60

80

R9, 3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2

R6, N2 R8, 0.1% NaCl(aq) R7, 3% NaCl(aq)

Treatment condition

Rel

ativ

e w

ater

per

mea

bilit

ych

ange

Δk r

w/k r

w, %

–80

–40

0

40

80

120

R9, 3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2

R6, N2 R8, 0.1% NaCl(aq) R7, 3% NaCl(aq)

Treatment condition

Effe

ctiv

e w

ater

per

mea

bilit

ych

ange

Δk e

w/k e

w, %

(b)

(a)

Fig. 16—Change of (a) brine effective permeability and (b) brine relative permeability in treated reservoir cores at various treat-ment conditions.

242 April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering

treatment conditions with initial saturation by water and brine in Berea results in less improvement of water effective permeability compared with treatment condition of cores initially saturated with nitrogen. The treatment condition of “3 % NaCl(aq)” in the reservoir core even decreases the water effective permeability substantially. The reduced water effective permeability caused by treatment condition of initial saturation is caused by the reduction of absolute permeability (Fig. 11a for Berea and Fig. 12a for the reservoir cores). The treatment condition from initial liquid satura-tion has less adverse effect on the relative permeability, krw, than on effective permeability, kew.

The results for krw give a strong indication that the chemical treatment changes the core surface from water-wetting to interme-diate gas-wetting. When the rock is less water-wetting, it has higher water permeability. In the hydraulic fracturing, water is injected to improve gas production. However, water is retained. By chemical treatment, we improve the water mobility, to reduce water reten-tion and to improve the gas-production rate. When the chemicals reduce gas absolute permeability by <10%, the treatment may still increase the water effective permeability >50%.

DiscussionFactors Affecting the Reservoir Wettability. Carbonate reser-voirs typically are more oil-wet than sandstone reservoirs (Chil-ingar and Yen 1983). When the effects of brine chemistry are not considered, silica (sandstone) tends to adsorb simple organic bases, while the carbonates tend to adsorb simple organic acids (Somasundaran 1975). This is because silica is normally negatively charged and has a weakly acidic surface in water near neutral pH, while carbonates are positively charged and have weakly basic surfaces (Stumm and Morgan 1970). These surfaces will prefer-entially adsorb compounds of the opposite polarity (acidity) by an acid/base reaction. Wettability of silica will be affected strongly by the organic bases, while carbonates will be affected strongly by the organic acids.

The salinity and pH of brine affect wettability because they change the charge on the rock surface, which in turn can affect the adsorption of surfactants (Leja 1982). Positively charged, cat-ionic surfactants will be attracted to negatively charged surfaces, while negatively charged, anionic surfactants will be attracted to positively charged surfaces. The surface charge of silica and calcite in water is positive at low pH, but negative at high pH. For silica, the surface becomes negatively charged when the pH increases above 2 to 3.7 (Stumm and Morgan 1970), while calcite does not become negatively charged with a pH larger than 8 to 9.5 (Soma-sundaran and Agar 1967). As discussed previously, silica is nega-tively charged near neutral pH and tends to adsorb organic bases, while calcite is positively charged and tends to adsorb organic acids. Calcite will adsorb cationic surfactants rather than anionic surfactants when the pH of the solution in which it is immersed is increased greater than 9.

Chemical Reaction With Silica. The chemicals used in our treat-ment consist of cationic perfl uoroalkyl methacrylic copolymer with pH≈6, which are attracted to the negatively charged silica surface and form chemical bonding for treatment permanency. Contact-angle, imbibition, and fl uid-fl ow data show that the initial satura-tion with nitrogen results in effectiveness of wettability alteration in Berea and reservoir cores (B26 and R6) compared with cores initially saturated with water (B27) and brine (B28, B33, B34, R7, R8). The effectiveness is manifested by homogeneous contact angle, high imbibition reduction, lower gas-absolute-permeability reduction, and higher water effective permeability. We propose three possible factors that are related to the interaction between the chemical, rock, and the initial saturating liquid: “chemical coagula-tion,” “salt deposition,” and “competitive adsorption.” According to the DLVO theory, a defi nite amount of ions will screen the Columbic repulsion and destabilize the colloids, leading to the coagulation, aggregation, and phase separation of the chemical solutions. In our stability tests, we found that the critical concen-tration for the mixture of treatment chemical and brine at weight ratio of approximately 1:1 is approximately 1 wt% chemical Z8 +

10 wt% NaCl(aq) brine. Therefore, the initial saturation with 3% NaCl(aq) brine with treatment solution of 1 wt% chemical Z8 is stable. Because the salt is dissolvable (up to a very high concentra-tion) in water but not in IPA, one may ask if there is salting out problem when chemicals in IPA solution mix with brine in the saturated core. The salting out might lead to large permeability reduction; it is ruled out by the fact that we do not detect salting in the stability test of the mixture of chemical and brine. There is also no measurable weight increase (<0.01 g) in treated cores. If 1 PV (approximately 15 cm3) of 3 wt% brine completely salts out in Berea, there would be an approximately 0.45-g increase in weight of the treated core.

Another possibility from the initial saturation is the competi-tion in reaction with rock between the chemical and the initial saturating liquid. The liquid molecules and salt ions may occupy the adsorption sites on the sandstone surface, and may adversely affect the treatment effectiveness. The possible mechanism in terms of surface chemistry is described as follows: For the nitro-gen-saturated cores, the injected chemical solution bonds onto the rock through ionic and/or silanol group (Tang and Firoozabadi 2002). For initial saturation with water of near neutral pH, the silica is negatively charged and has a weakly acidic surface, which is attributed to the dissociation of silanol groups:

SiOH SiO +Haq aq↔ ( )−

( )+ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (6)

The charged silica surface forms first an electric double layer with H+ and OH− ions from water. When there exists a definite amount of ions from initial brine saturation (cations of Na+, K+, Mg2+, Ca2+ or anions of Cl−, SO4

2−), the cations are attracted to the negatively charged silica and form a strong electrostatic bond of a thin elec-tric double layer (short Debye screen length) on the silica surface. As a result of ions’ competitive adsorption, the initial saturation of water/brine results in the impedance of the chemical bonding. The proposed mechanism of competitive adsorption explains the experimental results that the “dry cores” (saturated by nitrogen) have a better degree of wettability alteration by chemical treatment than the “wet cores” (saturated by water/brine). “Chemical coagu-lation” and “salt deposition” dominate at high concentration of salt and chemical solution, as shown in our stability testing in Fig. 5 (precipitation observed at 10 wt% NaCl(aq) brine mixed with 1 wt% chemical). For the treatment condition of 3 wt% NaCl(aq) brine with 1 wt% chemical in IPA solution, the competitive adsorp-tion is dominant.

Core Initial State. Cores in three different states of preserva-tion are used in core analysis: native, cleaned, and restored state (Anderson 1986). The most relevant results for multiphase-fl ow analyses are from the use of native-state cores, in which alterations to the wettability of the undisturbed reservoir rock are minimized. The second state is the cleaned cores, in which an attempt is made to remove all the fl uids and adsorbed organic materials by solvents. Cleaned cores are usually strongly water-wet and should be used only for measurements of porosity and air permeability. The third state is the restored-state cores, in which the native wettability is restored by a three-step process. The core is cleaned and then satu-rated with brine, followed by crude oil. Finally, the core is aged at reservoir temperature for approximately 1,000 hours. In our work to study the effect of treatment condition, we examine the effect of initial core state before chemical injection, which we termed “treatment condition,” on the chemical-treatment effectiveness, by varying the state of initial saturation and pretreatment.

To understand the effect of the pretreatment “H2O+N2” con-ducted after the initial saturation with brine and before the chemi-cal injection, we perform the following simple tests. In one set of tests, we conduct single-phase gas flow and water injection in the nitrogen-saturated core before introducing other fluids. After the core has been saturated with brine, followed by water displacement and nitrogen drainage (pretreatment), we conduct single-phase gas flow and water-injection tests in the nitrogen-saturated cores again. The two types of fluid-flow tests are then compared. Figs. 17a and 17b show the results of water injection in Berea and reservoir

April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering 243

cores, respectively (T = 140°C, p = 200 psig). For water injection in Berea and reservoir cores when saturated with NaCl brine, the pressure drop is higher than in those not saturated with NaCl brine (Cores B42, B44, R9). The change in permeability from salinity effect is shown in Table 1. The data indicate that both the gas absolute permeability and water effective permeability decrease because of the initial saturation with NaCl(aq) brine. After NaCl(aq) brine saturation, the gas absolute permeability decreases by 44–58% in Berea and by 23% in reservoir core; the water effective permeability decreases by 49–65% in Berea and by 52% in reservoir core. The decrease in water relative permeability indicates that the core becomes more water-wetting after satura-tion with NaCl brine. It is interesting to note that after CaCl2-brine saturation, there is a slight change in water effective permeability (increase by 10%) in Berea Core B43.

Kia et al. (1987) discuss the effect of brine and brine type on permeability change by the double-layer interactions between the surface of the clay particles and the pore wall. The clay is released from pore surface in the treatment condition of “3% NaCl(aq)+H2O+N2”. Our experimental results show that the pre-treatment process of fresh water displacing NaCl brine followed by nitrogen drainage improves the alteration of wettability. This

can be interpreted as the clay release clearing the adsorption sites for chemical and leading to higher chemical efficiency in the new core state. For the core in the treatment conditions of “3% CaCl2 (aq)+H2O+N2,” there is little or no clay release according to Kia et al. (1987). The pretreatment “H2O+N2” probably just clears the adsorption site originally occupied by Ca2+, which also leads to higher chemical efficiency compared with the core initially satu-rated with 3% CaCl2(aq) brine but without pretreatment.

ConclusionsOn the basis of the experimental results in this work, we draw the following conclusions: 1. The critical concentration for stability in the mixture of chemical

solution and brine (mixing ≈1:1 weight basis) is 1 wt% chemical Z8 + 10 wt% NaCl(aq). The coagulation occurs faster at higher concentration of chemical solution and brine. The combination of 1 wt% chemical Z8 + 3 wt% NaCl(aq) used in treatment is stable.

2. The initial core saturation by either water or brine adversely affects the efficiency of wettability alteration from treatment. In the mechanism of “competitive adsorption,” the initial saturat-ing liquid may occupy the adsorption sites and prevent the rock reaction with the treatment chemical.

(b)

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

55

60

0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35Time, PV

Pre

ssur

e dr

op, p

si

B42, before saturation with 3 wt% NaCl(aq)

B42, after saturation with 3 wt% NaCl(aq)

B44, before saturation with 3 wt% NaCl(aq)

B44, after saturation with 3 wt% NaCl(aq)

B43, before saturation with 3 wt% CaCl2(aq)

B43, after saturation with 3 wt% CaCl2(aq)

(a)

050

100150200250300350400

0 10 20 30 40 50 60

Pre

ssur

e dr

op, p

si

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R9, before saturation with 3 wt% NaCl(aq)

Fig. 17—Pressure drop vs. PV of water injection in nitrogen-saturated cores before and after saturation with 3 wt% NaCl(aq) brine in (a) Berea and (b) reservoir core.

244 April 2010 SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering

3. Our proposal for pretreatment remedies the adverse effect of initial brine saturation and results in treatment effectiveness, manifested by the uniform contact angle, low water imbibition, slight decrease of absolute permeability, and high increases in water effective permeability from chemical treatment.

4. The initial saturation with NaCl brine reduces the permeability of both Berea and the reservoir rock; this is not the case for CaCl2 brine. The clay released by NaCl brine clears the adsorp-tion sites, which improves the effectiveness of chemical reaction with silica.

5. Our experiments verify the mechanism of “competitive adsorp-tion” and the process of “clay release,” which are important in the understanding of interaction between sandstone, chemical treatment, and initially saturating liquid.

Nomenclature A = core cross-section area, cm2

D = core diameter, cm j = mass fl ux, g/(cm2-sec) k = permeability, md kr = relative permeability, dimensionless L = core length, cm M = molecular weight, g/mol nD = refractive index, dimensionless p = pressure, psi Q = volume fl ow rate, cm3/min R = gas constant, cm3-atm/(g-mol-K) S = saturation, dimensionless T = temperature, K Vp = core pore volume, cm3

W = core weight, g Z = gas deviation factor, dimensionless � = high-velocity coeffi cient, 10−6 cm−1 � = denotes difference � = contact angle, degrees � = viscosity, cp � = density, g/cm3

� = core porosity, dimensionless

Subscripts 1 = inlet 2 = outlet 20 = at 20ºC e = effective value g = gas l = liquid nC10 = normal decane o = oleic phase r = relative value w = aqueous phase

Superscripts ¯ = average

AcknowledgmentsThis work was supported by the consortium of RERI. We thank Clay Radke of the University of California-Berkeley and Yazdan Pedram Razi for helpful discussions.

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Metric Conversion Factors cp × 1.0* E–03 = Pa·s psi × 6.894 757 E+00 = kPa

*Conversion factor is exact.

Stanley Wu is a researcher at RERI. E-mail: shochenwu@rerinst.org. His research interests include wettability and fluid flow in porous media, surface wetting and cleansing, foam and emul-sion stability, particle interaction and structure formation, and emulsion polymerization. Wu holds BS and MS degrees from National Taiwan U., Taipei, Taiwan, and a PhD degree from Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, all in chemical engineering. Abbas Firoozabadi is a senior scientist and director at RERI. He also teaches at Yale U. E-mail: af@rerinst.org. Firoozabadi’s main research activities center on thermodynamics of hydrocarbon reservoirs and production and on multiphase/multicomponent flow in fractured petroleum reservoirs. He holds a BS degree from Abadan Institute of Technology, Abaadan, Iran, and MS and PhD degrees from the Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, all in gas engineering. Firoozabadi is the recipient of both the 2002 SPE Anthony Lucas Gold Medal and the 2004 SPE John Franklin Carll Award.