Surface Complexation Modelling of Wettability Alteration during Carbonated Water Flooding

Abstract

CO2 capture and utilization is an effective tool in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and hence, combating global warming. In the present study, surface complexation modeling (SCM) with the geochemistry solver, PHREEQ-C, was utilized to predict the wettability alteration of minerals, sandstone reservoir rocks (SRR), and pseudo-sandstone rocks (PSR) and mineral mixtures during carbonated water (CW) injection. The bond products, which is defined as the product of the mole fraction of oppositely charged mineral and oil surfaces, were calculated to estimate the wettability preferences. For the studied fluid systems, the results from SCM predicted that albite and quartz minerals were strongly water-wet while calcite was strongly oil-wet with formation water (FW). When it came to clay minerals, illite and montmorillonite were more oil-wet than quartz and less oil-wet than calcite. During CW injection (CWI), the wettability preferences of dominant minerals (considering weight and surface area) in SRR (i.e., quartz and calcite) were changed toward more water-wet, while for the clay minerals, the result was the opposite. The results from SCM showed that the wettability preferences of SRR were water-wet in both CW and FW. Moreover, increasing the amount of the water-wet minerals in mineral mixtures increased the rock’s tendency to become more water-wet.

Keywords

• wettability alteration
• carbonated water
• surface complexation modelling
• improved oil recovery
• CO₂ utilization