Surfactant-enhanced carbonated water alternating with CO2 (SCWAG) flooding, which integrates the advantages of surfactants, carbonated water (CW), and CO2, has demonstrated significant potential for the development of low-permeability reservoirs. Nonetheless, the underlying mechanisms of SCWAG-enhanced oil recovery require further elucidation. Its CO2 storage performance and pore-scale oil displacement characteristics have not been thoroughly investigated, and the influence of various factors on SCWAG performance remains poorly understood. This study, for the first time, investigates the pore-scale oil displacement characteristics and CO2 storage performance of SCWAG by integrating core flooding experiments and nuclear magnetic resonance scanning. An innovative core-scale 3D heterogeneous numerical model was developed using computed tomography scanning and refined via history matching, thereby enabling reliable SCWAG simulation and facilitating reservoir-scale analysis of factors affecting SCWAG performance. The results demonstrate that SCWAG notably improves both sweep efficiency and oil displacement efficiency, achieving higher recovery and CO2 storage efficiency than other methods. The total recovery reached 76.99%, with individual recoveries of 56.35%, 76.85%, and 87.96% for micropores, mesopores, and macropores, respectively, while the CO2 storage efficiency is 57.22%. Permeability contrast exerts a significant effect on recovery, whereas CO2 storage efficiency was primarily influenced by the injection rate and water-to-gas ratio. Moreover, the interaction between the water-to-gas ratio and permeability contrast exerts a substantial impact on both recovery and CO2 storage efficiency. This study provides novel insights and an in-depth analysis of the SCWAG process, offering practical guidelines for its application in low-permeability reservoirs.
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Petroleum Science 2026, 23(5): 2976-2990
Published: 03 December 2025
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