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Published September 25, 2019 | Supplemental Material + Accepted Version
Journal Article Open

Signatures of fluid–fluid displacement in porous media: wettability, patterns and pressures

Abstract

We develop a novel 'moving-capacitor' dynamic network model to simulate immiscible fluid–fluid displacement in porous media. Traditional network models approximate the pore geometry as a network of fixed resistors, directly analogous to an electrical circuit. Our model additionally captures the motion of individual fluid–fluid interfaces through the pore geometry by completing this analogy, representing interfaces as a set of moving capacitors. By incorporating pore-scale invasion events, the model reproduces, for the first time, both the displacement pattern and the injection-pressure signal under a wide range of capillary numbers and substrate wettabilities. We show that at high capillary numbers the invading patterns advance symmetrically through viscous fingers. In contrast, at low capillary numbers the flow is governed by the wettability-dependent fluid–fluid interactions with the pore structure. The signature of the transition between the two regimes manifests itself in the fluctuations of the injection-pressure signal.

Additional Information

© 2019 Cambridge University Press. Received 20 May 2019; revised 25 June 2019; accepted 4 July 2019; first published online 26 July 2019.

Attached Files

Accepted Version - 1906.02364.pdf

Supplemental Material - urn_cambridge.org_id_binary_20190726140529388-0314_S0022112019005548sup002.mp4

Supplemental Material - urn_cambridge.org_id_binary_20190726140529641-0886_S0022112019005548sup001.mp4

Files

1906.02364.pdf
Files (37.3 MB)

Additional details

Created:
August 19, 2023
Modified:
October 20, 2023