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Modeling and Experimental Validation of Rheological Transition During Foam Flow in Porous Media

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Abstract

Flow of nitrogen foam stabilized by alpha olefin sulfonate (C14-16 AOS) was studied in a natural sandstone porous media using X-ray Computed Tomography. Foam was generated by a simultaneous injection of gas and surfactant solution into a porous medium initially saturated with the surfactant solution. It was found that the foam undergoes a transition from a weak to a strong state at a characteristic gas saturation of Sgc = 0.75 ± 0.02. This transition coincided with a substantial reduction in foam mobility by a two-order of magnitude and also with a large reduction in overall water saturation to as low as 0.10 ± 0.02. Foam mobility transition was interpreted by the surge of yield stress as gas saturation exceeded the Sgc. We proposed a simple power-law functional relationship between yield stress and gas saturation. The proposed rheological model captured successfully the mobility transition of foams stabilized by different surfactant concentrations and for different core lengths.

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Acknowledgements

We thank H. van Asten, J. Etienne, and M. Friebel of TU Delft for their technical support. M. Simjoo acknowledges the financial support of Iran Ministry of Science, Research, and Technology for this study.

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  1. Faculty of Petroleum and Natural Gas Engineering, Sahand University of Technology, Tabriz, Iran

    M. Simjoo

  2. Department of Geoscience and Engineering, Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands

    P. L. J. Zitha

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Simjoo, M., Zitha, P.L.J. Modeling and Experimental Validation of Rheological Transition During Foam Flow in Porous Media. Transp Porous Med 131, 315–332 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11242-019-01251-9

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