Industrial applications of digital rock technology

•Industrial applications of digital rock technology.•Image acquisition and analysis techniques for digital rock modeling.•Comparison of network modeling to direct simulations on grid models.•Comparison of results from digital rock modeling versus traditional laboratory experiments.

This article provides an overview of the current state of digital rock technology, with emphasis on industrial applications. We show how imaging and image analysis can be applied for rock typing and modeling of end-point saturations. Different methods to obtain a digital model of the pore space from pore scale images are presented, and the strengths and weaknesses of the different methods are discussed. We also show how imaging bridges the different subjects of geology, petrophysics and reservoir simulations, by being a common denominator for results in all these subjects. Network modeling is compared to direct simulations on grid models, and their respective strengths are discussed. Finally we present an example of digital rock technology applied to a sandstone oil reservoir. Results from digital rock modeling are compared to results from traditional laboratory experiments. We highlight the mutual benefits from conducting both traditional experiments and digital rock modeling.

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