NMR of Confined Fluids: a Numerical Study using COMSOL with application in Petrophysics

Abstract

Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) is one of the main experimental tools to evaluate the production potential of porous rocks in oil wells. From the relative areas and mean values obtained from relaxation time distribution curves, information about fluid content, porosity and permeability can be obtained. In this report, a numerical study of pulsed NMR of confined fluids using the software COMSOL (license 9200972) is presented. This is done by solving the Bloch-Torrey equations considering surface relaxivity using the "flux/source" boundary conditions for different geometries, in the fast and slow diffusion regimes. The study is made for a single fluid and for a mixture of two coupled fluids (McConnell equations), first in isolated pores, and then in a "cylindrical porous plug" containing one single 20µm spherical pore surrounded by 800 × 2µm, unconnected, also spherical ones. NMR spectra and transverse relaxation are calculated as a function of pore sizes and coupling strength between fluids, for single π/2 pulses, followed by the FFT of the NMR signal (FID), and the echo amplitude after a spin-echo pulse sequence, respectively. The simulations show that, in the fast diffusion regime, pore sizes can be, 1 in principle, distinguished by transverse relaxation, but even in noiseless condition and full control of geometry, only a rough estimate of sizes can be obtained. A number of possible follow-up studies with COMSOL are discussed at the concluding remarks.