Rock Wettability

Instructional Objectives:
- Define Wettability, interfacial tension, and adhesion tension.
- Define and give examples of drainage and imbibition processes.
- Explain the difference between water-wet and oil-wet rocks.
- Explain the effects of wettability on waterflood performance.
- List the common laboratory methods to measure wettability.

Definitions:

Wettability: Tendency of one fluid to spread on or adhere to a solid surface in the presence of
other immiscible fluids.
Wettability refers to interaction between fluid and solid phases.

Interfacial tension is the force per unit length required to create a new surface.
Interfacial tension is commonly expressed in Newtons/meter or dynes/cm (Newtons/meter =
1,000 dynes/cm).

Adhesion tension can be expressed as the difference between two solid-fluid interfacial tensions.

AT = σ os − σ ws = σ ow cos θ

A negative adhesion tension indicates that the denser phase preferentially wets the solid surface.
An adhesion tension of zero indicates that both phases have an equal affinity for the surface.

Contact Angle:

σow
Oil

Oil θ Water Oil

σos σws Solid

The contact angle, θ, is measured through the denser liquid phase.

Contact angle ranges from 0o to 180o.
Contact angle defines which fluid wets the solid surface.

In hydrocarbon reservoirs:
Solid surface is reservoir rock (i.e., sandstone, limestone, dolomite or mixtures of each). Fluids
are oil, water, and/or gas.

Wetting Phase Fluid:

- Wetting phase preferentially wets the solid rock surface.

Rock Wettability 1
 - Because of attractive forces between rock and fluid, the wetting phase is drawn into
smaller pore spaces of porous media.
- Wetting phase fluid often is not very mobile.
- Attractive forces prohibit reduction in wetting phase saturation below some irreducible
value (called irreducible wetting phase saturation).
- Many hydrocarbon reservoirs tend to be either totally or partially water wet.

Nonwetting Phase Fluid:

- Nonwetting phase does not preferentially wet the solid rock surface.
- Repulsive forces between rock and fluid cause nonwetting phase to occupy largest pore
spaces of porous media.
- Nonwetting phase fluid is often the most mobile fluid, especially at large nonwetting
phase saturations.
- Natural gas is never the wetting phase in hydrocarbon reservoirs.

Water-wet Reservoir Rock:

Reservoir rock is considered to be water-wet if water preferentially wets the rock surfaces.
The rock is water-wet under the following conditions:
σws > σos
AT < 0 (i.e., the adhesion tension is negative).
0o < θ < 90o
If θ is close to 0o, the rock is considered to be “strongly water-wet”.

Force Balance – Water Wet Reservoir Rock

σow

Oil
θ Water

σos σws Solid

In water-wet rocks, contact angle, θ, is less than 90o and the interfacial tension between water
and the rock surface is larger than that between oil and the rock surface.

Oil-wet Reservoir Rock:

Reservoir rock is considered to be oil-wet if oil preferentially wets the rock surfaces.
The rock is oil-wet under the following conditions:
σos > σws
AT > 0 (i.e., the adhesion tension is positive).
90o < θ < 180o
If θ is close to 180o, the rock is considered to be “strongly oil-wet”.

Force Balance – Oil Wet Reservoir Rock

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 σow
Water

Oil

σos σws Solid

In oil-wet rocks, contact angle, θ, is greater than 90o and less than 180o. The interfacial tension
between water and the rock surface is less than that between oil and the rock surface.

Imbibition and Drainage Processes:

Imbibition:
- Fluid flow process in which the saturation of the wetting phase increases and the
nonwetting phase saturation decreases.
- Mobility of wetting phase increases as wetting phase saturation increases.

Example:
- Waterflooding an oil reservoir in which the reservoir rock is preferentially water-wet.

Drainage:
- Fluid flow process in which the saturation of the nonwetting phase increases.
- Mobility of nonwetting fluid phase increases as nonwetting phase saturation increases.

Example:
- Waterflooding an oil reservoir in which the reservoir rock is preferentially oil-wet.
- Gas injection in an oil- or water-wet oil reservoir.
- Pressure maintenance or gas cycling by gas injection in a retrograde condensate
reservoir.

Implications of Wettability:
- Wettability affects the shape of the relative permeability curves.
- Oil moves easier in water-wet rocks than oil-wet rocks.
- Primary oil recovery is affected by the wettability of the system:
- A water-wet system will exhibit greater primary oil recovery.
- Oil recovery under waterflooding is affected by the wettability of the system:
- A water-wet system will exhibit greater oil recovery under waterflooding.

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 Core Percent
no silicone Wettability

Recovery efficiency, percent, Soi

1 0.00 0.649
80 2 0.0200 0.176
1 3 0.200 - 0.222
2 4 2.00 - 0.250
3 5 1.00 - 0.333
60
Curves cut off at Fwd •100
4
40 5

20

0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
Water injected, pore volumes

Lab work4 shows that a strongly water-wet system will have breakthrough of water after most of
the production of oil has taken place, and very little production of oil will occur after water
breakthrough.
For oil-wet systems, water breakthrough occurs earlier in the flood and production continues for a
long period after water breakthrough at a fairly constant water/oil production ratio.

Squirrel oil - 0.10 N NaCl - Torpedo core (μ • 33 O W • 663,

K • 0945, Swi • 21.20%)
Recovery efficiency, percent Spi

Squirrel oil - 0.10 N NaCl • Torpedo Sandstone core,

after remaining in oil for 84 days (μ • 33.0 W • 663, K •
0.925, Swi • 23.28%)

80

60

40

20

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Water injection, pore volumes

The above figure4 shows that the core can change its wettability characteristics from water-wet to
oil-wet after immersion in oil for long times.
Under waterflooding, oil-wet rock will generally have lower recovery than water-wet rock.

Rock Wettability 4
Laboratory Measurement of Wettability:
Most common measurement techniques:
- Contact angle measurement method.
- Amott method.
- United States Bureau of Mines (USBM) Method.

Note that wettability measurements using core samples yield an indication of wetting preference
of the rock in the lab…. Not necessarily in the reservoir.

Knowing the wettability does not allow us to predict multi-phase flow properties. We still need to
know capillary pressure and relative permeability in order to predict the multi-phase properties.
However, knowing the wettability helps us understand the reservoir and anticipate or explain its
behavior.

Nomenclature:
AT = adhesion tension, dynes/cm
θ = contact angle between the oil/water/solid interface measured through the water, degrees
σos = interfacial energy between the oil and solid, dynes/cm
σws = interfacial energy between the water and solid, dynes/cm
σow = interfacial energy (interfacial tension) between the oil and water, dynes/cm

References:
1- Amyx, J.W., Bass, D.M., and Whiting, R.L.: Petroleum Reservoir Engineering, McGrow-Hill
Book Company New York, 1960.
2- Tiab, D. and Donaldson, E.C.: Petrophysics, Gulf Publishing Company, Houston, TX. 1996.
3- Core Laboratories, Inc. “A course in the fundamentals of Core analysis, 1982.
4- Donaldson, E.C., Thomas, R.D., and Lorenz, P.B.: “Wettability Determination and Its Effect
on Recovery Efficiency,” SPEJ (March 1969) 13-20.

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