Simulation of Multi-phase Flow through Porous Media Using Cvfe (control Volume Finite Element)

The paper presents the application of Control-Volume Finite Element (CVFE) method in simulation of multi-phase (water, oil, gas) flow through porous media. The numerical model developed using the CVFE method presents advantage in simulation of faulted reservoirs or simulation of complex geometry reservoir. Also, CVFE method can accurate represents the location of wells inside of reservoir, fact which conventionally cartezian grid can’t do. The numerical model uses both IMPES (Implicit PressureExplicit Saturation) and fullyimplicit techniques. One test case for validation of models is done by comparison with the simple case of one quasi-linear reservoir with two wells: one for water injection and the other for production. Also, this test case can be solved using the fractional flow theory (Buckley-Leverett). The comparison gives the satisfactory results, even if the water saturation distribution obtained by CVFE method presents a certain level of numerical dispersion. Another test uses a quarter from the classical five point pattern for water injection. This model contain two wells located on opposite corner of one rectangle, one well is for water injection with constant rate, the other well is for fluid (oil, gas and water) production. The results are compared with those provided by other numerical reservoir simulator, giving also the satisfactory results.