Experimental and numerical evaluation of relative permeability modifiers during water control in a tight gas reservoir

Relative permeability modifier (RPMs) is a water control technique that is implemented for enhancing gas recovery rates and prolonging well productive life during fracturing the tight gas reservoir. RPMs filtrate into formation for a certain depth along with the fracturing fluid to control water output by a "drag" effect on water phase only. To optimize RPM treatment, both experimental investigation and numerical simulation are used in this paper. In laboratory, transient core-flooding tests were conducted to investigate the water control performance of newly formulated polymer (RPM). The relative permeability of gas was corrected due to gas volume changes during displacement. The results showed that the selective water control effect of RPM by reducing water relative permeability dramatically with little impact on gas relative permeability. The RPM concentration was optimized as 0.01 %XSJ-14(A)+0.05 +0.05 %XSJ-14(B) while injection volume as 5PV by comparison of relative permeability curves. A 2D fracture model of a tight gas model was built to compare the production before and after RPM treatment. The results of numerical simulation confirmed the different flow control effect of RPM on water and gas. A sensitivity analysis was conducted for the effect of fracture length, fracture conductivity, RPM filtration and RR value. The results indicate that there are limits of all the factor on RPM's water control performance.