Multiphase flow prediction with deep neural networks

TL;DR

This paper introduces a deep neural network method for efficient and accurate multiphase flow prediction in heterogeneous domains, demonstrated on CO2 storage, with transfer learning and a web tool for practical use.

Contribution

The paper presents a novel deep neural network approach capable of handling high-dimensional heterogeneity and forces in multiphase flow prediction, including transfer learning for extrapolation.

Findings

High accuracy in CO2 saturation prediction

Effective transfer learning for extrapolation

Web-based tool for online flow calculations

Abstract

This paper proposes a deep neural network approach for predicting multiphase flow in heterogeneous domains with high computational efficiency. The deep neural network model is able to handle permeability heterogeneity in high dimensional systems, and can learn the interplay of viscous, gravity, and capillary forces from small data sets. Using the example of carbon dioxide (CO2) storage, we demonstrate that the model can generate highly accurate predictions of a CO2 saturation distribution given a permeability field, injection duration, injection rate, and injection location. The trained neural network model has an excellent ability to interpolate and to a limited extent, the ability to extrapolate beyond the training data ranges. To improve the prediction accuracy when the neural network model needs to extrapolate, we propose a transfer learning (fine-tuning) procedure that can quickly teach the neural network model new information without going through massive data collection and retraining. Based on this trained neural network model, a web-based tool is provided that allows users to perform CO2-water multiphase flow calculations online. With the tools provided in this paper, the deep neural network approach can provide a computationally efficient substitute for repetitive forward multiphase flow simulations, which can be adopted to the context of history matching and uncertainty quantification.