ABSOLUTE PERMEABILITY CALCULATION OF POROUS ROCK BASED ON PORE SCALE SIMULATION

• Main Author: Oksner Anggoh, Andrew
• Format: Final Project
• Language: Indonesia
• Online Access: https://digilib.itb.ac.id/gdl/view/83519
• Institution: Institut Teknologi Bandung

Fluid injection into the Earth's subsurface is a challenge in industry. The process of fluid injection into porous rocks plays an important role in Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) methods that can boost oil production and Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage (CCUS) technology to reduce carbon gas released into the atmosphere. Before the EOR method and CCUS technology are implemented, research needs to be carried out so that the fluid injection process into the Earth's subsurface runs optimally. An important physical parameter of porous rocks in the subsurface that can be studied is absolute permeability. In this research, the absolute permeability of porous rocks is investigated numerically by utilizing the Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) with Finite Volume Method (FVM). To measure the absolute permeability of porous rocks, a simulation is performed by simulating fluid flow into a porous rock sample and the discharge value of the fluid flow through the rock is calculated. Simulations were conducted on several porous rock samples with differing structural configurations but nearly identical porosity, approximately 22%. The study revealed that the absolute permeability values of the rocks can vary significantly. One of the porous rock samples investigated exhibited an absolute permeability of 15606 mD when fluid flowed in the x-direction and 1394 mD when fluid flowed in the z-direction. This is influenced by the pore structure in the rock. This study also investigated the relationship of absolute permeability with two variables related to the pore structure of the rock, namely the specific surface area and the branch length of fluid flow through the rock. The results show that the specific surface area or the branch length average is insufficient to describe the absolute permeability.