Research: General Information

The research projects are divided into two main categories:

  • Thermodynamics

Irreversible thermodynamics, interfacial thermodynamics and bulk-phase equilibrium thermodynamics cover research projects related to kinetics of hydrate, wax, and asphaltene precipitation and deposition, compositional variation in hydrocarbon reservoirs, gas condensate reservoirs, and cold production in heavy oil reservoirs, as well as efficient computations for hydrocarbon reservoir simulations.

  • Fluid Flow

Fluid flow mainly focuses on multiphase multicomponent flow in both fractured/layered and homogenous media. Issues related to natural depletion, gas injection and water injection are addressed. Effect of capillarity on flow in fractured porous media is the focus of research. Another important project is the alteration of wetability to intermediate and complete gas-wetting of porous media for a wide range of applications. Recently, we have embarked on a project to establish the reservoir properties from the gravitational potential variation of the sun and the moon.



Research: Projects

Bubble Nucleation in Porous Media

(Cold Production From Heavy Oil Reservoirs)

336

Thermodynamics of Micellization

(Asphaltene Precipitation From Live Oils)

413

Multicomponent Diffusion and Natural Convection in Porous Media

(Numerical Simulation of Compositional Variation in Fractured Porous Media)

164 164
164 164

Thermodynamic Stability Analysis in Multicomponent Mixtures

(Efficient Phase Behavior Computations)

292 292

Dimensionless TPD vs. the reduction and conventional variables for the C1/nC5/nC10 system at 300 K and 100 bar:
zC1 = 0.80, znC5 = 0.10, znC10 = 0.10.

Interfacial Thermodynamics

  • Kinetics of Gas Hydrates
199 199 199
  • Lowering of Surface Energy (Wettability Alteration to Intermediate Gas-Wetting in Gas Condensate Reservoirs)
200 200
water on chalk without chemical treatment water on chalk with treatment of 2.0% (wt) FC-722 (q = 120o)

from Li and Firoozabadi (SPE Res. Eval. & Eng., Mar. 2000)
  • Work of Hydrate Formation
197 197

from Kaschiev and Firoozabadi (J. Crystal Growth, 2002)

THERMODYNAMICS
(Bulk Phase Thermodynamics, Irreversible Thermodynamics, and Surface Thermodynamics)

Wax Deposition/Gas Hydrate Kinetics/Asphaltene Deposition; Nano-particles in flow assurance

Compositional Variation in HC Reservoirs

Gas Condensate Reservoirs/Well Productivity Improvement in Gas and Oil Production

Interfacial and Phase Behavior Modeling in CO2-Light and Heavy Oils and Heavy Oil-Steam and Heavy Oil-Steam Additives

HETROGENEOUS AND FRACTURED OIL and GAS RESERVIORS (Current focus on CO2 injection in oil reservoirs and recycling in gas condensate reservoirs)

Modeling of Water Injection Heterogeneous and in Discrete and Connected Fractured Media

Modeling of Gas Injection in Heterogeneous and in Discrete and Connected Fractured Media

Double Displacement Modeling in Fractured and Unfractured Reservoirs

Measurement and Modeling of Thermal Diffusion and Molecular Diffusion Coefficients in Multicomponent Systems