Nanoporous two-dimensional MoS ₂ membranes are excellent candidates for saline solution purification.

Numerical Calculation of Equivalent Permeability Tensor for Fractured Vuggy Porous Media Based on Homogenization Theory - Volume 9 Issue 1 - Zhaoqin Huang, Jun Yao, Yajun Li, Chenchen Wang, Xinrui Lv

Correlations of residual oil distribution with pore structure during the water flooding process in sandstone reservoirs

CO₂ injection to enhance shale oil recovery provides a win-win solution to meet the global fuel shortage and realize ultimate carbon neutrality. When shale reservoirs contain high salinity water, CO₂ injection can result in salt precipitation to block the nanometer pores in the shale, causing undesirable formation damage. Understanding salt precipitation and dissolution dynamics at the nanoscale are fundamental to solving this practical challenge. In this work, we developed a shale micromodel to characterize salt precipitation and dissolution based on nanofluidic technology. By directly distinguishing different phases from 50 nm to 5 μm, we identified the salt precipitation sites and precipitation dynamics during the CO₂ injection. For the salt precipitation in the nanometer network, we identified two precipitation stages. The ratio of the precipitation rates for the two stages is ~7.9 times that measured in microporous media, because of the slow water evaporation at the nanoscale. For the salt precipitation in the interconnected micrometer pores, we found that the CO₂ displacement front serves as the salt particle accumulating site. The accumulated salt particles will in turn impede the CO₂ flow. In addition, we also studied the salt dissolution process in the shale micromodel during water injection and found the classical dissolution theory overestimates the dissolution rate by approximately twofold. This work provides valuable pore-scale experimental insight into the salt precipitation and dissolution dynamics involved in shale formation, with the aim to promote the application of CO₂ injection for shale oil recovery.