The influence of bacterial biomass on hydraulic properties of porous media (bioclogging) has been explored as a viable means for optimizing subsurface bioremediation and microbial enhanced oil recovery. In this study, we present a pore network simulator for modeling biofilm evolution in porous media including hydrodynamics and nutrient transport based on coupling of advection transport with Fickian diffusion and a reaction term to account for nutrient consumption. Biofilm has non-zero permeability permitting liquid flow and transport through the biofilm itself. To handle simultaneous mass transfer in both liquid and biofilm in a pore element, a dual-diffusion mass transfer model is introduced. The influence of nutrient limitation on predicted results is explored. Nutrient concentration in the network is affected by diffusion coefficient for nutrient transfer across biofilm (compared to water/water diffusion coefficient) under advection dominated transport, represented by mass transport Péclet number >1. The model correctly predicts a dependence of rate of biomass accumulation on inlet concentration. Poor network connectivity shows a significantly large reduction of permeability, for a small biomass pore volume.
Summary We present a numerical simulation approach that allows incorporation of emulsion modeling into steam-assisted gravity-drainage (SAGD) simulations with commercial reservoir simulators by means of a two-stage pseudochemical reaction. Numerical simulation results show excellent agreement with experimental data for low-pressure SAGD, accounting for approximately 24% deficiency in simulated oil recovery, compared with experimental data. Incorporating viscosity alteration, multiphase effect, and enthalpy of emulsification appears sufficient for effective representation of in-situ emulsion physics during SAGD in very-high-permeability systems. We observed that multiphase effects appear to dominate the viscosity effect of emulsion flow under SAGD conditions of heavy-oil (bitumen) recovery. Results also show that in-situ emulsification may play a vital role within the reservoir during SAGD, increasing bitumen mobility and thereby decreasing cumulative steam/oil ratio (cSOR). Results from this work extend understanding of SAGD by examining its performance in the presence of in-situ emulsification and associated flow of emulsion with bitumen in porous media.
Expanding Solvent-Steam Assisted Gravity Drainage (ES-SAGD) was invented to enhance SAGD performance by reducing energy use while increasing oil production rates and recovery factor. ES-SAGD involves co-injection of solvent and steam. The majority of energy losses occur between the steam generator and sandface and at the top of the depletion chamber (to the overburden). ES-SAGD performance improvement is traditionally ascribed to oil phase dilution which in turn leads to oil phase viscosity reduction. However, the amounts of solvent added to the process are typically very small (< 5-6% by volume) thus it remains unclear how the solvent can lead to significant lowering of the steam-to-oil ratio (~25-50%) and large enhancements of the oil rate (~25 to 100%). Here, we report on how SAGD and ES-SAGD (hexane, heptane and octane solvents) can potentially perform in the presence of in-situ emulsification at steam chamber edge. We present a numerical approach which allows incorporation of emulsion modeling into SAGD and ES-SAGD simulations with commercial reservoir simulators via a two-stage pseudo chemical reaction. Numerical simulation results show excellent agreement with experimental data for low-pressure SAGD and ES-SAGD. Accounting for viscosity alteration, multiphase effect and enthalpy of emulsification appear sufficient for effective representation of in-situ emulsion physics during SAGD and ES-SAGD in very high permeability systems. Results also show that, in-situ emulsification may play a vital role within the reservoir during SAGD; increasing bitumen mobility thereby decreasing cSOR. It was concluded that traditional approach to numerical ES-SAGD simulation can significantly over-predict incremental oil recovery. Results from this work extend understanding of ES-SAGD by examining its performance improvement over traditional SAGD in terms of multiphase behavior at the edge of the chamber, thermal efficiency and incremental recovery. Results reveal that dynamics at the edge of the chamber is more complex than simple solvent dilution model.
Biofilm growth in subsurface porous media, and its treatment with biocides (antimicrobial agents), involves a complex interaction of biogeochemical processes which provide non-trivial mathematical modelling challenges. Although there are literature reports of mathematical models to evaluate biofilm tolerance to biocides, none of these models have investigated biocide treatment of biofilms growing in interconnected porous media with flow. In this paper, we present a numerical investigation using a pore network model of biofilm growth, formation damage and biocide treatment. The model includes three phases (aqueous, adsorbed biofilm, and solid matrix), a single growth-limiting nutrient and a single biocide dissolved in the water. Biofilm is assumed to contain a single species of microbe, in which each cell can be a viable persister, a viable non-persister, or non-viable (dead). Persisters describe small subpopulation of cells which are tolerant to biocide treatment. Biofilm tolerance to biocide treatment is regulated by persister cells and includes ‘innate’ and ‘biocide-induced’ factors. Simulations demonstrate that biofilm tolerance to biocides can increase with biofilm maturity, and that biocide treatment alone does not reverse biofilm-induced formation damage. Also, a successful application of biological permeability conformance treatment involving geologic layers with flow communication is more complicated than simply engineering the attachment of biofilm-forming cells at desired sites.
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