Heat transfer, imbition, gas generation, and other mechanisms have the potential to expel fluids from matrix blocks at sufficient rates and in sufficient quantities to be feasible. The objective of this study is to develop an accurate 3D three-phase dual porosity thermal simulator to study steam injection processes in naturally fractured reservoirs. The new simulator can model reservoirs with vertical fractures, horizontal fractures and their combination by appropriate subgridding of matrix blocks. The new simulator can also handle gas generation in the matrix, a capability not found in other simulators. These correlations are better than those previously reported in terms of accuracy, continuity, range of applicability, and simplicity.
Excellent agreement is achieved.
This implementation shows that the method can easily extend an exisiting single porosity simulator to a dual porosity simulator with very few changes to the existing code.