SPE 115710

Oil Recovery by Miscible SWAG Injection

M. Jamshidnezhad/ National Iranian South Oil Co
Copyright 2008, Society of Petroleum Engineers

This paper was prepared for presentation at the 2008 SPE Russian Oil & Gas Technical Conference and Exhibition held in Moscow, Russia, 2830 October 2008.

This paper was selected for presentation by an SPE program committee following review of information contained in an abstract submitted by the author(s). Contents of the paper have not been
reviewed by the Society of Petroleum Engineers and are subject to correction by the author(s). The material does not necessarily reflect any position of the Society of Petroleum Engineers, its
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Abstract
Previous studies showed that injection of water and gas as water alternating gas (WAG) process or simultaneous water and gas
(SWAG) process can improve the sweep efficiency. Therefore, oil recovery from depleted reservoirs can be enhanced by
combined injection of water and gas. However, SWAG process compare to WAG process is less known. Investigation of
factors that affect on miscible SWAG injection is the aim of this study. For this purpose, a three-dimensional finite-difference
reservoir simulator is used. Methane (as gas) at minimum miscibility pressure (MMP) is injected into an under-saturated
reservoir which contained typical North Sea oil. Water and gas are injected at fixed rates by two separate horizontal wells. For
more sweep efficiency and increase the distance gas and water travel before segregation, gas is injected at the bottom of
reservoirs. For water, different locations of injection are tested and the effect of water injection location is studied. We also
investigate the effect of water to gas injection rate ratios, well models, and reservoir heterogeneity on sweep efficiency and oil
recovery.

Introduction

Injection of gases (steam, CO2 or hydrocarbon gas) is an important method for increasing recovery in declining oil fields. Gas
improved oil recovery (IOR) can in principle recover nearly all the oil in place, but sweep efficiency of injected gas is poor
(Lake, 1989). Reasons for poor sweep efficiency include reservoir heterogeneity, low density of gas, and low viscosity of the
gas. In relatively homogeneous reservoirs low gas density, leading to gravity override, can severely limit gas sweep and oil
recovery. In most cases gas is injected together with, or alternating with, water, to reduce gas mobility.
In a homogeneous reservoir the flow of fluids is influenced by the density and mobility differences between the injected and
resident fluids. In heterogeneous reservoir permeability differences play a dominant role (Waggoner et al., 1992). The injected
fluid(s) prefer to flow through high-permeability layers, which lead to channeling. The low-permeability layers are bypassed
and not swept by the solvent.
If heterogeneities are not present, gravity governs fluid flow in the reservoir. Solvent in general has a lower density than oil
(and water) and segregates to the top of the reservoir, leaving the bottom part untouched by the solvent.
Previous studies showed that injection of water and gas as water alternating gas (WAG) process or simultaneous water and gas
(SWAG) process can improve the sweep efficiency. Therefore, oil recovery from depleted reservoirs can be enhanced by
combined injection of water and gas (Jamshidnezhad et al. 2008).
The equations of Stone (1982) and Jenkins (1984) predict the distance gas and water travel before they segregate completely
into underride and override zones. The equations describe the steady state that would eventually be attained once all mobile oil
has been removed from the region in which segregation occurs. ). In each zone (mixed, override and underride) saturations and
mobilities are uniform. In rectangular and cylindrical flow, the mixed zone disappears at position Lg and Rg, respectively:

( )
g
m
z w g rt
Q
L
k gW
=

(1)
( )
g
m
z w g rt
Q
R
k g
=

(2)
2 SPE 115710
where Q is total volumetric injection rate of gas and water, kv vertical permeability, w and g densities of water and gas,
respectively, g gravitational acceleration, and rtm the total relative mobility in the mixed zone.
Shi and Rossen (1998) show that Eqs. 1 and 2 can be recast in the following way:
( )
1
g
m h
g L z w g
p L
Hk
L N R Lk g


=

(3)
( ) ( )
( )
( )
1
2
g
m h
g z g g L g w g
p R
Hk
R k N R R R g


=

(4)

In Eq. 3, L is the length of the reservoir; N
g
and R
L
are dimensionless gravity number and reservoir aspect ratio, respectively,
|p|
m
the lateral pressure gradient in the mixed zone at the injection face, H reservoir height, and k
h
horizontal permeability. In
Eq. 4, gravity number and reservoir aspect ratio are defined as functions of the segregation length R
g
, the pressure gradient
used in the gravity number, |p|
m
(R
g
), is defined as the horizontal pressure gradient that would be present in the mixed zone at
radial position R
g
in the absence of any gravity segregation.
At later study, Stone (Stone 2004) showed that injecting gas along with water gives higher oil recovery than water flood alone.
He concluded that simultaneous water and immiscible gas floods can reduce water flood residual oil saturations by 50-100 %
in water-wet and intermediate-wet reservoirs, and can provide over 3-fold greater vertical gas sweep than alternate injection.
The studies presented by Stone did not investigate effects of different parameters on SWAG. Investigation of factors that affect
on miscible SWAG injection is the aim of this study. For this purpose, a three-dimensional finite-difference reservoir simulator
is used. Methane (as gas) at minimum miscibility pressure (MMP) is injected into an under-saturated reservoir which
contained typical North Sea oil. Water and gas are injected at fixed rates by two separate horizontal wells. For more sweep
efficiency and increase the distance gas and water travel before segregation, gas is injected at the bottom of reservoirs. For
water, different locations of injection are tested and the effect of water injection location is studied. We also investigate the
effect of water to gas injection rate ratios, well models, and reservoir heterogeneity on sweep efficiency and oil recovery.

Reservoir Model

We built the reservoir model by rectangular Cartesian grids. A summary of reservoir dimensions and physical properties can
be seen in Table 1. Gas (methane) and water are injected by two separate horizontal wells on the left-hand site, and fluids are
produced by a vertical production well located on the right-hand site of the reservoir. The reservoir is initially saturated by
typical North Sea oil (Boersma 1990). PVT properties of oil are summarized in Table 2. Reservoir temperature is 100
o
C and
fluids are injected at 348 bar (minimum miscibility pressure, MMP, Boersma 1990). In all cases, simulations are done in a
randomly generated permeability field, with perturbations of 10%. The values of k
z
and k
h
are randomly selected from a
uniform distribution extending 10% below and 10% above the average permeability values for each direction. Variations of
vertical and horizontal permeability along the wells are plotted in Figure 1. Figure 2 shows relative permeability data.
A three-dimensional compositional finite-difference reservoir simulator, STARS (Computer Modeling Group, Alberta,
Canada), is used to determine the effects of several design parameters on the efficiency of SWAG injection process. STARS
(Steam, Thermal, and Advanced Processes Reservoir Simulator) is CMG's advanced processes simulator for modeling the
flow of three-phase, multi-component fluids, which includes options such as chemical/polymer flooding, thermal applications,
steam injection, horizontal wells, flexible grids and many more.
The injection technique involves the simultaneous injection of water at different locations of the reservoir formation and
injecting gas at the bottom of the formation for 10 years. Figure 3 shows the schematic representation of the proposed SWAG
injection technique.

Table 1: Grid size and rock properties for different cases
Volume
(L*W*H) m3
No. of grids
( Nx*Ny*Nz)
Total injection
rate (res.m3/d)
Porosity
(fraction)
Horizontal
permeability (md)
Vertical
permeability (md)
(32*40*20) 64*10*43 15000 0.25 1000 210








SPE 115710 3
Table 2: Fluid properties
Fluid Density (kg/m3) Viscosity
(cp)
Water 1000 1
N2 163 0.0144
C12H26 804 0.86


Figure 1. Variations of vertical and horizontal permeability along the wells
Kx
920
940
960
980
1000
1020
1040
1060
1080
1100
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16
Grid block number in J direction
K
x

(
m
D
)

Kz
0
50
100
150
200
250
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16
Grid block number in J direction
K
z

(
m
D
)





Figure 2. Relative permeability data
0
0.1
0.2
0.3
0.4
0.5
0.6
0.7
0.8
0.9
1
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1
Sw
K
r
Krw
Krow

0
0.1
0.2
0.3
0.4
0.5
0.6
0.7
0.8
0.9
1
0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
Sl
K
r
Krg
Krog








4 SPE 115710
Figure 3. schematic representation of the proposed SWAG injection technique.




Simulation Runs

For better understanding the effect of different parameters, we define a "base case" and then compare other cases with the base
case. The base case represents a homogeneous reservoir initially saturated with oil (at So) and water (at Swc), and then water
is injected at the middle and gas is injected at the bottom through two horizontal wells. For this case, total injection rate of gas
and water is about 7000 sm
3
/day and water fraction of 0.28.
Figures 4 and 5 show the results of 10 years gas and water injection in "base case". As we can see from Figure 4, the
ultimate recovery for simultaneous injection of water and gas in base case is about 75%. Figure 5 shows that segregation
occurs after 7 m traveling in layer 10. Figure 6 reveals nearly uniform movement of fluids before segregation.

Figure 4. Recovery factor in base case model Figure 5. Gas-water segregation in base case, view in IK plane

Base case
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
0 1000 2000 3000 4000
Time
RF


In the next case, we investigate effect of water injector location on oil recovery and segregation. Figures 7 and 8 show
schematics of two cases: case with water injection at top of reservoir and case with water injection near gas injection well. As
we can see from Figure 9, changing the location of water injector has no effect on oil recovery factor. For these cases
segregation again occurs at 14
th
grid( in i-direction) and movement of fluids before segregation is nearly uniform, Figures
10-13.
Effect of gas flow rate on segregation length is shown in Figures 14 and 15. In this case we doubled gas flow rate from
7000 sm
3
/day to 14000 sm
3
/day. Figure 16 compares oil recovery factor of this case to base case.
Another case is a case with double water injection rate. Results of this case are shown in Figures 17 and 18. Effect of
increasing water injection rate on oil recovery and its comparison to base case is shown in Figure 19.
The last case we study is a heterogenic model. In this case vertical and horizontal permeability are distributed randomly.
Horizontal permeability data are between 1 and 1000 md, vertical permeability data are between 1 and 220 md, Figure 20.
Effect of heterogeneity on oil recovery is shown in Figure 21. From Figure 22, one can see that heterogeneity increases
non-uniformity of gas through the reservoir, however, segregation length is greater than base case, see Figure 23.
SPE 115710 5
Figure 6. Fluids uniform flow before complete segregation Figure 7. Schematic of SWAG, water at nearly top


Figure 8. Schematic of SWAG, water at nearly bottom Figure 9. Effect of water injector location on recovery factor

0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
0 1000 2000 3000 4000
Time (day)
R
F
Base case
Water is injected at top
water is injected near
gas well




Figure 10. Gas-water segregation, case of Figure 11. Gas-water segregation, case of
water at top, view in IK plane water at top, view in IJ plane









6 SPE 115710
Figure 12. Gas-water segregation, case of Figure 13. Gas-water segregation, case of
water at nearly bottom, view in IJ plane water at nearly bottom, view in IK plane


Figure 14. Gas-water segregation, case of Figure 15. Gas-water segregation, case of
doubled gas injection rate, view in IJ plane doubled gas injection rate, view in IK plane




Figure 16. Effect of gas injection rate on recovery factor Figure 17. Gas-water segregation, case of doubled water
injection rate, view in IK plane
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
0 1000 2000 3000 4000
Time (day)
RF
Gas rate doubled
Base case









SPE 115710 7
Figure 18. Gas-water segregation, case of doubled water Figure 19. Effect of water injection rate on recovery factor
injection rate, view in IJ plane

0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
0 1000 2000 3000 4000
Time (day)
RF
Base case
water is injected at
doubled rate



Figure 20. Horizontal and vertical permeability distribution in heterogeneous case



Figure 21. Effect of heterogeneity on oil recovery factor Figure 22. Gas-water segregation, case of heterogeneous
view in IJ plane
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
0 1000 2000 3000 4000
Time (day)
RF
Base case
Heteregenous case









8 SPE 115710

Figure 23. Gas-water segregation, case of heterogeneous view in IK plane




Conclusions
Simultaneous water and gas injection into petroleum reservoirs is more efficient than alone gas injection and water injection.
In this study, we investigated effect of several factors on simultaneous water and gas injection. These factors were gas to water
injection rates, location of water injector, and heterogeneity of horizontal and vertical permeabilities. As we can see from
Figure 24, these factors have no strong effect on oil recovery factor. However, they can affect on segregation length and non-
uniformity of gas flow.

Figure 24. Effect of different factors on oil recovery factor

0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000 3500 4000
Time (day)
RF
Gas rate doubled Base case
Heteregenous case Water is injected at top
water is injected near gas well water is injected at doubled rate





References
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112375, presented the 2008 SPE International Symposium and Exhibition on Formation Damage Control held in Lafayette, Louisiana,
U.S.A., 1315 February 2008
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Symposium on Enhanced Oil Recovery, Tulsa, OK, April 15-18.
Lake, L.: Enhanced Oil Recovery, Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ (1989).
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