RATE OF WETTABILITY ALTERATION BY CASPIAN SEA ENGINEERED WATER IN CARBONATE FORMATIONS

Abstract

Most carbonate reservoirs in the Caspian Sea region are heterogeneous and oil wet. The utilization of conventional water flooding does not usually result in significant incremental oil recoveries. Tuning the salinity and composition of the injecting fluid could alter the wettability towards the more water-wet state. The rate of alteration in crude oil-brine - carbonate rock (CBR) interactions such as wettability is a critical parameter to design the duration of the engineered water flooding for the field application....