Dispersion of Solvent in Crude Oil Saturated Porous Media

In this study a series of single source solvent injection experiments have been performed on glass micromodel as porous medium. Experiments conducted on porous models that initially saturated with the crude oil at several fixed flow rate conditions. The hydrocarbon solvent concentration as a function of location and time is measured using image analysis of color intensity of continuously provided pictures during injection process. The provided concentration calibration curve of solvent in crude oil has been used for back calculating of the solvent concentration along the dispersion zone. The longitude and transverse dispersion coefficients are determined by fitting the predicted solvent concentration profile from numerical solution of the convection-diffusion equation to experimental data. It has been observed that both longitude and transverse dispersion coefficients are mostly affected by flow field. The estimated dispersion coefficients are in close quantitative agreement with the data available in the literature.

Keywords:

Dispersion Coefficient , Convection-Dispersion Equation , Image Analysis