The Characteristics of Gas-Water Two-Phase Radial Flow in Clay-Silt Sediment and Effects on Hydrate Production

Many hydrate-bearing sediments in the Shenhu area of the South China Sea are featured with unconsolidated clayed silt, small particle size, and high content of clay, which can pose a great challenge for gas production. In order to investigate the gas-water relative permeability in clay-silt sediment...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Geofluids 2021, Vol.2021, p.1-14
Main Authors: Lu, Cheng, Qin, Xuwen, Yu, Lu, Geng, Lantao, Mao, Wenjing, Bian, Hang, Meng, Fanle
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Analysis
Clay
Empirical analysis
Empirical models
Experiments
Flow distribution
Flow pattern
Fractals
Gas flow
Gas production
Hydrates
Multiphase flow
Natural gas
Nitrogen
Oil and gas production
Particle size
Permeability
Pressure reduction
Production capacity
R&D
Radial flow
Research & development
Research methodology
Reservoirs
Sandstone
Saturation
Sediment samples
Sedimentary rocks
Sediments
Silt
Soils
Two phase flow
Viscosity
Water
Water measurement
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Summary:Many hydrate-bearing sediments in the Shenhu area of the South China Sea are featured with unconsolidated clayed silt, small particle size, and high content of clay, which can pose a great challenge for gas production. In order to investigate the gas-water relative permeability in clay-silt sediments, through a radial flow experiment, samples from the target sediment in the Shenhu area were selected and studied. The results show that the irreducible water saturation is high and the influence of the gas-water interaction is obvious. The relative permeability analysis shows that the two-phase flow zone is narrow and maximum gas relative permeability is below 0.1. The flow pattern in clay-silt sediment is more complicated, and the existing empirical models are inadequate for flow characterization. The depressurization method to extract a hydrate reservoir with clay-silt sediments faces the problem of insufficient production capacity. Compared with the ordinary hydrate reservoir with sandstone sediment, the hydrate reservoir with clay-silt sediment has a low permeability and poor gas flow capacity. The gas-water ratio abnormally decreases during the production. It is urgent to enhance production with cost-effective measures.
ISSN:1468-8115
1468-8123
DOI:10.1155/2021/6623802