Experimental investigation of the water bypass phenomenon in light oil reservoirs using a glass micromodel and sand cores with a hydrophobic material

A large volume of water is bypassing oil and comes up without being able to push it out from the reservoir after organic material adsorption. This work investigates hydrophobicity effect on rock wettability, oil recovery, and relative permeability. The mu XRF was used to characterize sand cores, and a contact angle goniometer to determine fluids contact angle. Oil recovery was evaluated by measuring the incremental oil volume recovered in a glass and PVC capillary designed micromodel. Relative permeability was studied using the steady state method, and the wettability was determined by the Amott method. The results show that cores are mainly composed of quartz 86.04%. Oil recovery was 30.50% for oil-wet state; where the wettability index was -0.283. Thereafter, it has been demonstrated that the surfactant solution increases the oil recovery with 23.54 %. Adsorption of surfactants on functional groups of PVC change the contact angle between water and PVC's surface from 112 degrees to 39 degrees, decrease the IFT and restore the water-wet state. PVC debris presents efficient new method to determine the water by pass effect on oil recovery. The findings of this study help for better understanding the surfactant-oil displacements during water flooding in light oil reservoirs with impaired wettability.