Exsolving two-phase flow in oil wells

ABSTRACT Oil wells contain two-phase liquid and gas mixtures driven upwards due to a pressure gradient. In this paper, we study a two-fluid model for vertical upwelling flow and explicitly account for the exsolution of the dissolved gas as the pressure decreases along the well. We find that the application of Henry's law for the dissolved gas concentration predicts a rapid transition to a foam, which runs counter to intuition. In order to study ways in which this rapid transition could be avoided, we examine rate limiting non-equilibrium dynamics by incorporating nucleation and bubble growth dynamics in the two-phase model.