The Flow of Foam Through Porous Media
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- In order to obtain information basic to the foam-drive oil recovery process, the flow of foam through relatively short porous media has been investigated. Independent physical measurements have been made on the same foam in order to define both its apparent viscosity and its quality.Foam was produced from aqueous solutions of Aerosol MA in a novel foam generator and then introduced into the porous media where both its flow rate and pressure drop were measured. The porous media used were sand-packs having different permeabilities as well as several consolidated porous media. Liquid saturations within the porous media were determined through an electrical resistivity measurement. Foam quality, G, expressed as the ratio of the gas volume to total volume was varied over the range from 0.70 to 0.97 by controlling the feed to the foam generator. Additional optical density measurements were also made in an effort to determine the average bubble size in the foam. Since foam has been described as a non-Newtonian fluid, the apparent foam viscosity has been determined with a variety of viscometers covering a wide range of shear rates.It has been shown that although foam is composed of two distinct and immiscible phases and is thermodynamically unstable, it behaves like a uniform and semistable fluid with measurable properties of its own and with little change occurring in its properties over the moderate periods of time while it is flowing through a porous medium. It has been found that effective permeability-apparent viscosity ratio is greatly dependent upon the quality G, and the absolute permeability of the porous medium.Also for a foam given quality, G, the ratio of relative permeability to apparent viscosity is a decreasing function of the absolute permeability of the porous medium. The ratio increases sharply with the total liquid saturation within the porous medium. A linear relationship between electrical resistivity and the foam quality was observed on a log-log scale. It appears that optical density of foam reflects the amount of liquid rather than the number of air-liquid interfaces.Apparent foam viscosity is also dependent upon its quality, increasing linearly in the quality range from 0.70 to 0.90, then sharply between 0.90 to 0.95 till the foam collapses. The apparent foam viscosities increased with decreasing rate of shear in a modified Fann viscometer.The apparent foam viscosities obtained from the modified V-G Fann Meter are probably too high to be applicable to the foam flowing through a porous medium, whereas those obtained from the Bendix-Ultraviscoson are somewhat lower than those expected within a porous medium. The apparent foam viscosities obtained from capillary tube viscometer could not be correlated with the physical properties of foam. The apparent viscosity of foam flowing through a sand-pack with an air permeability of 58 darcys was believed to range from 10 cp to 20 cp.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Date created | June 1965 |
Creators/Contributors
| Author | Khan, Suhail A. |
|---|---|
| Primary advisor | Marsden, Jr., Sullivan S. |
| Degree granting institution | Stanford University, Department of Petroleum Engineering |
Subjects
| Subject | School of Earth Energy & Environmental Sciences |
|---|---|
| Genre | Thesis |
Bibliographic information
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Preferred citation
- Preferred Citation
- Khan, Suhail A. (1965). The Flow of Foam Through Porous Media. Stanford Digital Repository. Available at: https://purl.stanford.edu/rp780dm7255
Collection
Master's Theses, Doerr School of Sustainability
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