Fundamentals of Foam Transport in Porous Media

Download or read book Fundamentals of Foam Transport in Porous Media written by and published by . This book was released on 1993 with total page 71 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Foam in porous media is a fascinating fluid both because of its unique microstructure and because its dramatic influence on the flow of gas and liquid. A wealth of information is now compiled in the literature describing foam generation, destruction, and transport mechanisms. Yet there are conflicting views of these mechanisms and on the macroscopic results they produce. By critically reviewing how surfactant formulation and porous media topology conspire to control foam texture and flow resistance, we attempt to unify the disparate viewpoints. Evolution of texture during foam displacement is quantified by a population balance on bubble concentration, which is designed specifically for convenient incorporation into a standard reservoir simulator. Theories for the dominant bubble generation and coalescence mechanisms provide physically based rate expressions for the proposed population balance. Stone-type relative permeability functions along with the texture-sensitive and shear-thinning nature of confined foam complete the model. Quite good agreement is found between theory and new experiments for transient foam displacement in linear cores.