Department of Chemical & Petroleum Engineering

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Browsing Department of Chemical & Petroleum Engineering by Author "Adeyanju, O"

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    Open Access
    Simulation of Paraffin Deposition in Petroleum Reservoirs
    (Nova Science Publishers, Inc., 2011-07) Adeyanju, O; Oyekunle, L.
    Paraffin deposition within petroleum reservoir during crude oil production can cause a decrease in reservoir performance, consequently the need to predict wax deposition is a major concern to all petroleum producers. The paper presents the development processes of a numerical simulator to model the deposition of Paraffin in the reservoir and it also shows the effects of the Paraffin (wax) deposition on the skin factor in the reservoir. A one-dimensional, three-phase and four-pseudo-component model for paraffin deposition was developed. The paraffin retention by static and dynamic pore surface depositions and pore throat plugging were considered. A fully implicit finite difference numerical scheme was developed and solved by a double iteration procedure. The model when applied to a typical field condition showed that the wax precipitation and consequently deposition to be a near well-bore phenomenon where the pressure gradient is relatively higher than those attainable far in the reservoir. Though little, the paraffin deposition was shown to cause decrease in the porosity, permeability and consequently higher skin in the porous medium especially near the well-bore region. Hence frequent stimulation by heat treatments of the near well-bore region is highly advisable for wells which produce high waxy crude so as to neutralize the skin effects cause by wax deposition in the region.