A fractal model for the electrical conductivity of water-saturated porous media during mineral precipitation-dissolution processes

TL;DR

This paper introduces a fractal-based model to predict electrical conductivity in water-saturated porous media, accounting for mineral precipitation and dissolution, with implications for aquifer and reservoir monitoring.

Contribution

It develops a new physically-based upscaling model that relates microstructural fractal descriptions to electrical conductivity in porous media.

Findings

Model accurately matches experimental data

Electrical conductivity correlates with permeability during mineral processes

Applicable to both unconsolidated and consolidated samples

Abstract

Precipitation and dissolution are prime processes in carbonate rocks and being able to monitor them is of major importance for aquifer and reservoir exploitation or environmental studies. Electrical conductivity is a physical property sensitive both to transport phenomena of porous media and to dissolution and precipitation processes. However, its quantitative use depends on the effectiveness of the petrophysical relationship to relate the electrical conductivity to hydrological properties of interest. In this work, we develop a new physically-based model to estimate the electrical conductivity by upscaling a microstructural description of water-saturated fractal porous media. This model is successfully compared to published data from both unconsolidated and consolidated samples, or during precipitation and dissolution numerical experiments. For the latter, we show that the permeability can be linked to the predicted electrical conductivity.