Page 269 - Reservoir Formation Damage

Two-Phase Formation Damage by Fines Migration 249

constant for deposition by pore throat plugging. Civan (1990, 1996)
proposed a dimensionless correlation to determine the conditions favorable
for pore throat plugging in single phase fluid media. This equation
determines the critical ratio of the pore throat-to-particle diameters below
which pore throat plugging by jamming of particles occurs. Thus,

< D./
k tjjts = 0 , when D tD p (1 1-37)
For multi-phase flow, this equation can be modified as:

(11-38)

where the pore throat-to-particle diameter ratio and the particle Reynolds
numbers are given, respectively, by:

(11-39)
Per = A

(11-40)

in which the total particle mass flux is given by:

V (11-41)
J J
and the saturation weighted average particle diameter is given by:

V (11-42)

Liu and Civan (1993, 1995, 1996) have resorted to a simplified approach
in an adhoc manner and demonstrated by comparison of the results with
experimental data that it works. They assumed that the fraction of the
plugged pore throats is proportional to the amount of particles detained
behind the plugged pore throats. Therefore, their expression for the
fraction of the nonplugged pore throats can be written as:

(11-43)