Abstract
This paper describes a new upscaling algorithm, which combines the key aspects of nonuniform coarsening methods and renormalization based multiphase methods. The algorithm is applied to a range of heterogeneous, two dimensional geological descriptions. Extensive simulation results indicate that the new algorithm is able to provide results on highly coarsened grids ((5 x 5)) that are in close agreement with fine grid ((100 x 100)) simulations, at least for the set of problems considered. This very large degree of coarsening is more than an order of magnitude greater than could be achieved with either of the original methods individually, as currently implemented. For the set of problems considered, the algorithm is unbiased and consistent, even at very large levels of scale up.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
J.W. Barker and P. Dupouy, An analysis of dynamic pseuod relative permeability methods, in: Proceedings of the 5th European Conference on the Mathematics of Oil Recovery, Leoben, Austria (September 1996).
J.W. Barker and S. Thibeau, A critical review of the use of pseudorelative permeabilities for upscaling, SPE Res. Engrg. (1997) 138–143.
M.A. Christie, Upscaling for reservoir simulation, JPT 48 (1996) 1004–1010.
M.A. Christie, M. Mansfield, P.R. King, J.W. Barker and I.D. Culverwell, A renormalisation-based upscaling technique for WAG floods in heterogeneous reservoirs, Paper SPE 29127 presented at the 1995 SPE Symposium on Reservoir Simulation, San Antonio, February 12–15 (1995).
L.J. Durlofsky, Numerical calculation of equivalent grid block permeability tensors for heterogeneous porous media, Water Res. Research 27 (1991) 699–708.
L.J. Durlofsky, Use of higher moments for the description of upscaled, process independent relative permeabilities, SPEJ 2 (1997) 474–484.
L.J. Durlofsky, R.A. Behrens, R.C. Jones and A. Bernath, Scale up of heterogeneous three dimensional reservoir descriptions, SPEJ 1 (1996) 313–326.
L.J. Durlofsky, R.C. Jones and W.J. Milliken, A nonuniform coarsening approach for the scale up of displacement processes in heterogeneous porous media, Advances in Water Resources 20 (1997) 335–347.
J. Glimm, H. Kim, D.H. Sharp and T.C. Wallstrom, A stochastic analysis of the scale up problem for flow in porous media, Computational and Applied Mathematics 17 (1998) 67–79.
T.A. Hewett and R.A. Behrens, Considerations affecting the scaling of displacements in heterogeneous permeability distributions, SPE Formation Evaluation (1993) 258–266.
P.R. King, The use of renormalization for calculating effective permeability, Transport in Porous Media 4 (1989) 37–58.
P.R. King, A.H. Muggeridge and W.G. Price, Renormalization calculations of immiscible flow, Transport in Porous Media 12 (1993) 237–260.
M.A. Malik, Geostatistical reservoir characterization and scale-up of permeability and relative permeability, Ph.D. thesis, University of Texas at Austin (1996).
A. H. Muggeridge, Generation of effective relative permeabilities from detailed simulation of flow in heterogenerous porous media, in: Reservoir Characterization II (Academic Press, New York, 1991) pp. 197–225.
H.L. Stone, Rigorous black oil pseudo functions, SPE Proceedings (1991) 57–68.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Wallstrom, T.C., Hou, S., Christie, M.A. et al. Accurate scale up of two phase flow using renormalization and nonuniform coarsening. Computational Geosciences 3, 69–87 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1011570724061
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1011570724061