Darcy-and pore-scale issues associated with multi-phase fluid flow through a petroleum reservoir

TLDR: In this article, the authors focus on the constraints associated with the extended version of Darcy's law that is used to describe the multiphase flow through a porous media; and in particular, a petroleum reservoir.

Abstract: This manuscript primarily focuses on the constraints associated with the extended version of Darcy’s law that is used to describe the multiphase flow through a porous media; and in particular, a petroleum reservoir. This manuscript clearly brings out the basics associated with the usage of Darcy’s law, and reasons out the inapplicability of the Navier-Stokes Equation in order to describe the momentum conservation in a typical petroleum reservoir. Further, this work highlights the essence of continuum-based Darcy’s macroscopic-scale equation with that of Navier-Stokes’s microscopic-scale equation. Further, the absence of capillary forces in original Darcy’s equation and extending the same by considering the concept of ‘capillary pressure’ in order to accommodate the multi-phase flow has several critical constraints associated with it. In this manuscript, all these constraints or limitations have been posed in the form of a list of basic queries that need to be addressed or at least to be understood with clarity, when applying the multi-phase fluid flow equations associated with a petroleum reservoir. This study is limited to an oil-water two-phase system.