An Experimental Method for One Dimensional Permeability Characterization of Heterogeneous Porous Media at the Core Scale

Many reservoir simulator inputs are derived from laboratory experiments. Special core analysis techniques generally assume that core samples are homogeneous. This assumption does not hold for porous media with significant heterogeneities. This paper presents a new method to characterize core scale permeability heterogeneity. The method is validated by both numerical and experimental results. The leading idea consists in injecting a high viscosity miscible fluid into a core sample saturated with a low viscosity fluid. In such conditions, the fluid displacement is expected to be piston-like. We investigate the evolution of the pressure drop as a function of time. A continuous permeability profile is estimated along flow direction from the pressure drop assuming that the core sample is a stack of infinitely thin cross sections perpendicular to flow direction. Thus, we determine a permeability value for each cross section. Numerical and laboratory experiments are carried out to validate the method. Flow simulations are performed for numerical models representing core samples to estimate the pressure drop. The selected models are sequences of plugs with constant permeabilities. In addition, laboratory displacements are conducted for both low permeability and high permeability core samples. To investigate whether there is dispersion inside the porous medium, CT scan measurements are performed during fluid displacement: the location of the front is observed at successive time intervals. The results validate the methodology developed in this paper as long as heterogeneity is one dimensional.