. Bulletin. WATER PROBLEMS. n by the dark and light spots, indicating mixed pockets of oil, water,and air. These pictures show many other interesting data whichwill be brought out by Mills in a later paper. Mills found that in the fine sand, water slowly displaced the oilwhich moved upward into the coarse sand and there segregated abovethe water. In time, a large part of the oil that was retained in thefine sand would thus migrate into the coarse sand. However, underordinary field conditions it is doubtful whether the operator wouldbenefit, because the exchange between oil and water in fine ti
. Bulletin. WATER PROBLEMS. n by the dark and light spots, indicating mixed pockets of oil, water,and air. These pictures show many other interesting data whichwill be brought out by Mills in a later paper. Mills found that in the fine sand, water slowly displaced the oilwhich moved upward into the coarse sand and there segregated abovethe water. In time, a large part of the oil that was retained in thefine sand would thus migrate into the coarse sand. However, underordinary field conditions it is doubtful whether the operator wouldbenefit, because the exchange between oil and water in fine tight sandsis very slow. During the time that thie exchange is taking place, thepumping of excessive quantities of water with relatively small quan-tities of oil would make operation of the wells unprofitable. Theeffects of the exchange are not felt until the damage has been donethrough hydraulic flow of the water through the more open parts ofthe sands. In other words, there is at first sight a rapid movement. Arrows indicatepath of water liGiRK 13.—Sketch to show how fluid advances most rapidly through the coarse sandsand the water thus traps the oil in the fine tight sand. There is incomplete segregationof oil and water in the mi^ium-grained sand (No. 4 in fig. 12). along the paths qf least resistance under the laws of hydraulic flowof liquids, followed by a readjustment under the laws of capillarity. Figures 12, 13, and 14 are hypothetical sketches to show how fluidadvances most rapidly throligh the coarse sands and thus leaves be-hind oil in the fine tight sand, much of which is eventually lost be-yond recovery. In figure 12 the texture of the different sands isshown. In figure 14 the original water line is shown by the solidline; in figure 13 the water has advanced through the coarse sand to the well; this is shown in figure 14 by the dashed line marked its flow through sand 2 the water invades slightly at times thefine sands 1 and 3, which is shown in figure 14
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, booksubjectminesandmineralresou
