Evaluation of preformed particle gel treatment using homogeneous and heterogeneous models

This research investigates the effects of preformed particle gel (PPG) in remedying the problems of excess water production and low oil recovery of heterogeneous reservoirs by placing the PPG in the high-permeability layer, thus diverting displacing brine to the unswept low permeability layer. This investigation was completed with three tasks.;The first task was to evaluate the PPG swelling kinetics and strength as a function of concentration of brine. The result of this task indicate that PPG prepared with low concentration of brine swells more, becomes weaker, more deformable than PPG prepared with high concentration of brine.;The second task is to investigate the injection pressure and permeability reduction factors caused by the injection of PPG on a homogeneous coreflooding model. The results of this task indicates that PPG swollen with low concentration of brine caused higher injection pressure and permeability reduction than PPG swollen with high concentration of brine. This permeability reduction was more significant with higher permeability sandstone cores.;The third task evaluated the effect of PPG on profile modification, water cut reduction and oil recovery using parallel heterogeneous sandpack model. The results of this task indicates that the injection profiles of the different permeability contrast were modified after PPG injection. The water cut reduced during PPG injection and oil recovery from the unswept low permeability layers were improved after PPG injection. However, the total oil recovery increased more as the permeability contrast between the low and high permeability sandpacks reduces.