Abstract
The spontaneous imbibition phenomenon is an important process in hydrocarbon recovery. Laboratory study of imbibition is affected by many parameters including, rock characteristics, boundary conditions, length of the sample, variable interfacial tension, and sample heterogeneity. Investigating spontaneous imbibition enhances our understanding of the imbibition mechanism and, hence, helps improve waterflooding used in the oil industry. A simple apparatus has been developed to resemble naturally fractured reservoirs. Using the developed apparatus, the effects of lithology, permeability, and wettability on spontaneous imbibition have been experimentally investigated. Some encountered unexpected technical problems during the experiments are overcome and reported in this paper. Details of the developed apparatus are shown and spontaneous imbibition results are presented. First, the effect of permeability on the oil recovery rate is presented. In addition, obtained curves of oil recovery by water spontaneous imbibition using different lithology are presented. Finally, results of oil recovery from Berea sandstone core sample before and after wettability alteration are shown.