Study on Phase Behavior in Pores of Different Types of Shales and Its Impact on CO<sub>2</sub> Huff-Puff

Shale oil resources have significant strategic value, and CO<sub>2</sub> huff-n-puff technology is a key means for developing shale oil reservoirs. Due to the extensive development of nanopores in shale reservoirs and the complex and diverse mineral compositions, there are significant differences in the oil production laws in different pores during the CO<sub>2</sub> huff-n-puff process. To address this issue, starting from the core factor affecting productionphase behaviorthis paper first constructs a phase equilibrium model considering the influence of nanopore size and wettability; then, based on the principle of material conservation, it establishes a CO<sub>2</sub> huff-n-puff numerical model. Through simulation calculations, it analyzes the production laws of multicomponent hydrocarbons in different CO<sub>2</sub> huff-n-puff cycles under the conditions of different pore sizes and wettabilities. The results indicate that the bubble point pressure decreases as the pore size reduces. During pressure depletion production, more liquid is produced from small pores, resulting in a higher content of heavy components. In the early stage of CO<sub>2</sub> huff-n-puff, more methane (CH<sub>4</sub>) is displaced by CO<sub>2</sub> in small pores; as the number of cycles increases, the production of light and medium components in pores of different sizes tends to be consistent, with the heavy component production in 10 nm pores being slightly higher. The reduction of contact angle enhances the fluid-solid interaction, lowers the bubble point pressure, increases the liquid-phase yield, and thus increases the yield of heavy components. With increasing huff-n-puff cycles, pores with smaller contact angles contain fewer heavy components in the remaining fluid, leading to higher bubble point pressure and increased gas-phase production.

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Journal
ACS Omega
Published
2025-10-02
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1021/acsomega.5c07951
Primary Topic
Hydrocarbon exploration and reservoir analysis
Type
article
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article

Study on Phase Behavior in Pores of Different Types of Shales and Its Impact on CO2 Huff-Puff

Wentong Zhang, Zhan Qu, Binshan Ju, Shun Liu et al.
ACS Omega
Hydrocarbon exploration and reservoir analysis
article

Study on Phase Behavior in Pores of Different Types of Shales and Its Impact on CO2 Huff-Puff

Wentong Zhang, Zhan Qu, Binshan Ju, Shun Liu, Xiong Liu, Jianbin Liu, Nannan Liu, Yapeng Tian, Xiaopeng Ma
article en

Abstract

Shale oil resources have significant strategic value, and CO<sub>2</sub> huff-n-puff technology is a key means for developing shale oil reservoirs. Due to the extensive development of nanopores in shale reservoirs and the complex and diverse mineral compositions, there are significant differences in the oil production laws in different pores during the CO<sub>2</sub> huff-n-puff process. To address this issue, starting from the core factor affecting productionphase behaviorthis paper first constructs a phase equilibrium model considering the influence of nanopore size and wettability; then, based on the principle of material conservation, it establishes a CO<sub>2</sub> huff-n-puff numerical model. Through simulation calculations, it analyzes the production laws of multicomponent hydrocarbons in different CO<sub>2</sub> huff-n-puff cycles under the conditions of different pore sizes and wettabilities. The results indicate that the bubble point pressure decreases as the pore size reduces. During pressure depletion production, more liquid is produced from small pores, resulting in a higher content of heavy components. In the early stage of CO<sub>2</sub> huff-n-puff, more methane (CH<sub>4</sub>) is displaced by CO<sub>2</sub> in small pores; as the number of cycles increases, the production of light and medium components in pores of different sizes tends to be consistent, with the heavy component production in 10 nm pores being slightly higher. The reduction of contact angle enhances the fluid-solid interaction, lowers the bubble point pressure, increases the liquid-phase yield, and thus increases the yield of heavy components. With increasing huff-n-puff cycles, pores with smaller contact angles contain fewer heavy components in the remaining fluid, leading to higher bubble point pressure and increased gas-phase production.

ACS OmegaVol. 10(40)
Xi'an Shiyou University (CN), China University of Geosciences (Beijing) (CN), State Key Laboratory of Oil and Gas Reservoir Geology and Exploitation (CN), University of Petroleum (ID), Changzhou University (CN)
Openalex Percentile: Top 69%
Hydrocarbon exploration and reservoir analysis
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