Modeling and Experimental Validation of Rheological Transition During Foam Flow in Porous Media

Flow of nitrogen foam stabilized by alpha olefin sulfonate (C _14-16 AOS) was studied in a natural sandstone porous media using X-ray Computed Tomography. Foam was generated by a simultaneous injection of gas and surfactant solution into a porous medium initially saturated with the surfactant solution. It was found that the foam undergoes a transition from a weak to a strong state at a characteristic gas saturation of S _gc = 0.75 ± 0.02. This transition coincided with a substantial reduction in foam mobility by a two-order of magnitude and also with a large reduction in overall water saturation to as low as 0.10 ± 0.02. Foam mobility transition was interpreted by the surge of yield stress as gas saturation exceeded the S _gc . We proposed a simple power-law functional relationship between yield stress and gas saturation. The proposed rheological model captured successfully the mobility transition of foams stabilized by different surfactant concentrations and for different core lengths.