Study of diffusivity of hydrocarbon solvent in heavy oil saturated sands using computer assisted tomography

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2011
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Abstract
Hydrocarbon solvent-assisted processes are thought to be effective EOR technologies for heavy oil and bitumen production. In order to describe those processes quantitatively, the diffusivity of hydrocarbon solvent in oil sands is a required crucial parameter. The effective diffusivity in porous media is smaller than the true diffusivity in bulk fluids. However, good-quality data from diffusion experiments of heavy oil and solvent for effective diffusivity determination in porous media is still scarce. This thesis includes two sections. The first section discusses the impact of volume changes due to mixing on diffusivity of liquid solvent in heavy oil. The second section presents diffusion experiments of liquid solvent in heavy oil saturated sandpacks using X-ray Computer Assisted Tomography (CAT), and determines the effective diffusivity based on an updated approach, which implies extended diffusion model and new data processing method considering porosity variation of sandpacks and volume changes on mixing. Subsequently the relationship between the effective diffusivity and the molecular diffusivity is investigated.
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Bibliography: p. 80-83
Some pages are in colour.
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Citation
Luo, H. (2011). Study of diffusivity of hydrocarbon solvent in heavy oil saturated sands using computer assisted tomography (Master's thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca. doi:10.11575/PRISM/4099
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