Novel Microfluidic Device for Dew Point Pressure Measurement of Retrograde Gas Condensates

Abstract

Accumulation of liquid dropout in gas condensate reservoirs occurs when the pressure falls below the dew point and leads to declining well productivity. We have developed a microfluidic device to accurately measure the dew point pressure of retrograde gas condensates. Using the capillary effect, the device captures small quantities of condensed liquid as the fluid pressure crosses the phase boundary. The dew point pressure is determined by visual detection of the liquid in high-curvature areas of the device. We have conducted validation tests on live reservoir samples, with peak liquid dropout ranging from 1.3 to 13.0%. We have demonstrated that the microfluidic device can measure the dew point pressure with an accuracy of ±1 MPa. The novel microchannel design allowed us to accurately measure dew points of lean condensates, which are often difficult to detect in conventional methods. Furthermore, this method requires small sample volume and is significantly faster than the conventional laboratory techniques. Thus, this rapid dew point measurement technique can be used to characterize gas condensates at multiple temperatures and provide vital information about reservoir fluid behavior for production planning and optimization.

Past, Present, and Future of Microfluidic Fluid Analysis in the Energy Industry

“…Transitioning microfluidics to high pressure and high temperature. Modular compression fittings schematics reproduced from (a) Marre et al and (b) Mostowfi et al (c) plot showing selective high pressure and temperature conditions in microfluidics achieved by various researchers in the last two decades. ,,,,,− (a) From ref . Copyright 2010 American Chemical Society.…”

“…Microfluidic measurements have been applied broadly in chemical, biological, and physical processes that are relevant to sensing, such as glass micromodels, capillary electrophoresis, and gas chromatography. In the area of fluid property measurement , microfluidics has enabled high accuracy measurements of phase and thermophysical properties such as bubble and dew points, − solution gas-oil ratios, solubility and diffusivity, − minimum miscibility pressures, , wax crystallization, , and asphaltenes precipitation. − Microfluidics has also been applied to resolve the pore-scale dynamics of in situ reservoir processes such as polymer flooding, , fluid rheology, chemical and foam injection, − gas flooding, − and thermal-solvent processes. − …”

Nanofluidic gas/liquid switching utilizing a nanochannel open/close valve based on glass deformation

“…There has been increasing interest in the miniaturization of chemical unit operations such as reaction, mixing and extraction to produce micro unit operations (MUOs) [7][8][9]. These MUOs have been combined to achieve integration of chemical processing for various microfluidic applications such as synthesis, environmental analysis, and biomedical analysis [10][11][12][13][14].…”