huff and puff experiment

Huff and Puff Challenge

You can huff and puff, but the piece of paper won't go in the bottle thanks to bernoulli's principle.

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Putting an item into an empty soda bottle is a piece of cake. Just drop the object through the mouth of the bottle, right? Well, we have a challenge for you. Place a small item in the mouth of a bottle and attempt to blow the object into the bottle using a straw. Not so easy, now is it? What is happening here?

Experiment Videos

Here's What You'll Need

Small paper ball, 1-liter bottle, drinking straw, various small objects, let's try it.

Create a small ball by bunching up a piece of paper. The ball needs to be able to loosely sit inside the mouth of the bottle. Place the paper ball in the mouth of a 1-liter bottle that has been placed on its side.

Direct a straw towards the mouth of the bottle and attempt to blow the paper ball into the bottle.

The paper ball wiggles and jiggles around before flying out of the bottle!

Replace the paper ball with a similar object in the mouth of the bottle and try again. Even the popcorn will just not go into the bottle. Why?

How Does It Work

As you might have guessed, the Huff and Puff Challenge has a lot to do with air pressure and air movement. With an item like the paper ball resting in the mouth of the bottle, it would make sense that the air from the straw would blow it into the bottle, but the exact opposite happens.

The secret is inside of the bottle. Although we refer to the bottle as being “empty,” it’s actually full to the brim. That’s impossible… we can’t see anything! Well, can you see the air that you breathe? The bottle is filled with air! Trying to blow more air into the bottle is impossible, just like if you were to put your lips directly on the mouth of the bottle and blow. It doesn’t work!

While you can’t blow air into the bottle, you are moving quite a bit of air along the sides of the bottle. When the air blows past the mouth of the bottle, it creates an area of low pressure behind it. This is called Bernoulli’s Principle. This area of low pressure is exactly what the paper ball needs to hop out of the bottle’s mouth!

Take It Further

Try doing the experiment with other objects! Do you get the same results, or do the results change?

Consider trying the following objects:

• Small marshmallow
• Small foil ball
• Wedding mint
• Small gift bow
• Piece of popcorn

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Fantastic Fun & Learning

Fun learning activities and things to do with kids

Wind Science Experiment Three Little Pigs Activity

By Kayla Dees 2 Comments · This content may contain affiliate links.

“I’ll huff and I’ll puff, and I’ll BLOW your house down!” These words echo the infamous line of one determined wolf who wanted to blow some little piggies’ houses down. It’s also one of our favorite parts to read aloud and enact when reading The Three Little Pigs. This classic children’s story has so many wonderful literacy, math, and science activity extensions you can explore. Today we’re sharing a fun Three Little Pigs activity. This wind science experiment can be performed rather easily by just grabbing a few objects from around your house or classroom.

Wind Science Three Little Pigs Activity

FIND ALL OF THREE LITTLE PIGS ACTIVITIES IN OUR PRINTABLE LESSON PLANS

For  home preschool  and  preschool classrooms ..

• 3 objects of varied weight
• hair dryer, fan, or your very own breath
• free printable prediction and observation sheet
• painter’s tape (optional)

Getting Started

We first read the original version of The Three Little Pigs, giving attention to the materials chosen and blown down. Then we were ready to put on our thinking caps and perform this science experiment. To set up this science investigation, gather three items of varying weight. We used a tissue, a plastic Duplo block, and a container of Playdough. Decide on what form of “wind” you would like to use. We decided to try both a hair dryer and our own “huffing and puffing.”

Before you begin blowing, ask children to predict which items would be blown away by the wolf’s huffing and puffing. Allow children to hold the items and make comparisons. Record these predictions on the free printable prediction and observation sheet. This would be an excellent opportunity to discuss comparative vocabulary such as light, lighter, lightest or heavy, heavier, heaviest. Depending on the writing level of each child, you may have them draw a picture of their prediction and then write beginning sounds or words to label their picture. You may also choose to have the child dictate their prediction to you.

Experiment and Observations

Once predictions are made, test the materials. We decided to place a piece of tape down to have a better visual on how far each item blew. One by one, set each item on the piece of tape and BLOW! The kids got a big kick out of how the piece of tissue literally flew and then floated off the table!

It was surprising how the little Duplo block was able to scoot across the table with some wind. And actually go pretty far!

Most predictions were confirmed when we were unable to blow the container of Play-Doh. My little scientists were excited to finalize their predictions and observations on their sheets.

Of course we had to try our own huffing and puffing too. After all of the predictions and observations were recorded, we repeated the experiment using our very own breath to see if we could move the objects ourselves.

This part was a big hit, as the kids thoroughly enjoyed huffing and puffing like the Big Bad Wolf!

To wrap up this fun wind experiment, we revisited the text and reviewed the materials the wolf was able to blow down and also the one that wasn’t so easy. The children immediately were able to make comparisons to the materials they were able to blow and the one that didn’t budge a bit.

GET THE FREE PRINTABLE

We love hands-on learning and making to connections to books. We hope you have just as much fun with this Three Little Pigs activity as we did!

GET A FULL WEEK OF THREE LITTLE PIGS THEME LEARNING AND PLAY

Save time and get right to the playful learning with our printable lesson plan sets. Each set includes over 30 playful learning activities related to the theme, and we’ve provided different versions for home preschool families and classroom teachers so all activities are geared directly toward your needs.

This set includes active hands-on learning ideas and the following printables:

1) STEM Challenge Recording Sheet (in color and B/W) 2) Count and Build Math Mats (in color and B/W) and Number Cards (1-30) 3) Ordinal and Sequencing Cards for Whole Group and Small Group Activities (in color and B/W) 4) Dice Game Mats (in color and B/W) and 6 Game Cube Options 5) Wind Science Investigation Recording Sheet (in color and B/W) 6) Three Little Pig Character Puppets (in color and B/W) 7) Three Little Pigs Alphabet Puzzles (in color and B/W) 8) Shape House Building Challenge Mats (in color and B/W) 9) Pig 10-Frame Counting Mats and Counting Pieces (in color and B/W) 10) Three Little Pigs Patterning 11) Three Little Pigs Number Cards 0-35 (in color and B/W)

GET YOUR LESSON PLANS

Home Preschool Three Little Pigs Theme Lesson Plans

Preschool Classroom Three Little Theme Lesson Plans

All of our products are also available on  Teachers Pay Teachers  if you prefer to shop there.

Reader Interactions

March 29, 2024 at 7:17 pm

This is a amazing activity for the little ones. They experiment the wind from their body. It was so fun and enjoyable. Thank you

November 11, 2021 at 3:41 pm

We do a STEM unit that includes similar activities; however, it is one that we only get to do using the big unit every other year, due to the time it takes. This will allow me to still cover the main concepts of the STEM unit in a shorter timeframe. Thank you for sharing this fun and educational science/STEM resource!

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Toddler Approved

Simple hands on activities for busy parents.

Huff and Puff Science Exploration

Not only is this Huff and Puff science activity a fun way to teach about air, but it is also a great way to increase and strengthen oral coordination.

Materials Needed: various sized straws and tubs (you could use toilet rolls or paper towel rolls like we did... or just roll up a piece of paper and tape it together).

2. Next, have your child test out their prediction.

(we had fun enlisting help from dad with this activity!)

Have your child decide (after trying out the straw, tube, and own mouth), which method works the best to move objects.

We continued our discussion about air as we read the story of The Three Little Pigs (by Steven Kellogg) and watched this fun Disney Silly Symphony about the Three Little Pigs ... followed by an episode of Max & Ruby (Max and the Three Little Bunnies... which is based on the three little pigs story).

Here's the Disney silly symphony so you can check it out!

Idea modified from The Best of the Mailbox Preschool- Huff and Puff science activity.

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The Year of Play is a simple ebook filled with a year of hands-on playful learning activities. It is created for kids ages 2-6 years old and includes 12 monthly calendars and 48 weekly activity plans!

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The Gas Huff-n-Puff PVT Experiment

By Mathias Lia Carlsen, July 2021

*This is a short-version of URTeC 5016 by Mydland, Carlsen and Whitson found attached to this article.

Gas EOR in Tight Unconventionals

The gas-based Huff-n-Puff (HnP) process is currently the dominating EOR process in tight unconventionals.  This has happened as a result of operators looking to find new ways of increasing the production from their acreage, and several field implementations of the HnP process that have claimed success in doing so. Although the process has been studied largely the last years, there are still several aspects of the HnP process that are not yet fully understood, particularly its complex nature regarding the fluid phase behavior.

To help increase the understanding of the HnP process from a fluid perspective, we suggest a novel PVT experiment that captures the key characteristics of the HnP process, and provide all relevant stakeholders with the key performance indicator (KPI) that we refer to as the gas HnP recovery efficiency, defined as “incremental volume of stock-tank oil (STO) produced per volume of surface gas injected” (which in field terms is denoted incremental STB of oil produced per MMscf injected).

The HnP Process

The gas HnP process is fundamentally different from a conventional/traditional displacement process. Conventional gas EOR is based on a configuration of designated injection- and production wells, whereas the HnP process is based on a single well in which injection and production are performed cyclically.

Carlsen et al. (2019), and Mydland et al. (2020), describe in detail why the HnP process is not a displacement process, and therefore how the conventional EOR theory becomes irrelevant. The HnP process achieves recovery by mixing the injected gas and the reservoir fluid by either vaporization of reservoir-fluid components into the gas phase when the system is in two-phase equilibrium, or by dissolving of the injected gas into the reservoir fluid when the system is single phase.

The HnP PVT Experiment

For conventional gas EOR processes, a central part of planning involves estimating the multi-contact minimum miscibility pressure (MMP MC ), as this is the lowest pressure for which the displacement front can sustain miscible displacement efficiency. As a result, multiple experiments have been suggested to get an estimate of the MMP MC . The traditional, and most reliable, is the slimtube test (Yellig and Metcalfe 1980, Dindoruk et al. 2020). Other less accurate experiments have been introduced on the argument of being less time consuming and thus cheaper to perform than the slimtube (Christiansen and Haines 1987, Rao 1987).   

That is why we suggest this novel fluid experiment that captures the key characteristics of the gas HnP process, which are i) injection periods with associated pressure build up, ii) production periods with associated pressure drawdown, iii) a cyclic nature, and iv) a way of quantifying oil recovery versus number of cycles and/or volume (moles) of gas injected. Because we look at fluids only, and are not relying on small residual amounts left in core plugs, we obtain accurate measurements and tracking of the material balance throughout the experiment.

We emphasize that the proposed HnP PVT experiment assumes ideal conditions. It does not account for aspects such as time, spatial pressure variations, incomplete mixing, diffusion/dispersion, confinement/containment issues, fluid heterogeneity, and fracture/matrix flow. This means that the experiment provides an estimate of the HnP performance that represents an upper bound of what to expect in field.

All the technical details of the experiment can be found here

Carlsen, M., Whitson, C., Dahouk, M. M., Younus, B., Yusra, I., Kerr, E., … Mydland, S. (2019a, July 31). Compositional Tracking of a Huff-n-Puff Project in the Eagle Ford. Unconventional Resources Technology Conference. doi:10.15530/urtec-2019-539

Dindoruk, Birol , Johns, Russell , and Franklin M. Orr. “Measurement and Modeling of Minimum Miscibility Pressure: A State-of-the-Art Review.” SPE Res Eval & Eng 24 (2021): 367–389. doi: https://doi.org/10.2118/200462-PA

Mydland, Stian , Yusra, Ilina , Whitson, Curtis Hays, Dahouk, Mohamad Majzoub, and Mathias Lia Carlsen. “Gas EOR Processes in Tight Unconventionals.” Paper presented at the SPE Improved Oil Recovery Conference, Virtual, August 2020a. doi: https://doi.org/10.2118/200396-MS

Tovar, Francisco D., Barrufet, Maria A., and David S. Schechter. “Enhanced Oil Recovery in the Wolfcamp Shale by Carbon Dioxide or Nitrogen Injection: An Experimental Investigation.” SPE J. 26 (2021): 515–537. doi: https://doi.org/10.2118/204230-PA

Rao, Dandina N. 1997. A new technique of vanishing interfacial tension for miscibility determination. Fluid Phase Equilibria 139 (1): 311-324. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378381297001805

Yellig, W.F., and R.S. Metcalfe. “Determination and Prediction of CO2 Minimum Miscibility Pressures (includes associated paper 8876 ).” J Pet Technol 32 (1980): 160–168. doi: https://doi.org/10.2118/7477-PA

Learn more about our  consulting  capabilities

Global Curtis Hays Whitson [email protected]

Asia-Pacific Kameshwar Singh [email protected]

Middle East Ahmad Alavian [email protected]

Americas Mathias Lia Carlsen [email protected]

About whitson whitson supports energy companies, oil services companies, investors and government organizations with expertise and expansive analysis within PVT, gas condensate reservoirs and gas-based EOR. Our coverage ranges from R&D based industry studies to detailed due diligence, transaction or court case projects. We help our clients find the best possible answers to complex questions and assist them in the successful decision-making on technical challenges. We do this through a continuous, transparent dialog with our clients – before, during and after our engagement. The company was founded by Dr. Curtis Hays Whitson in 1988 and is a Norwegian corporation located in Trondheim, Norway, with local presence in USA, Middle East, India and Indonesia

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Huff and Puff: Designing a Device for Measuring Exhalation Volume

This resource provides a cross-curricular design and technology project which links to work on the lungs and respiration. Children design and make a device to measure maximal exhalation volume. They also discover more about the work of biomedical engineers throughout the process. This resource was designed for use with learners at upper primary and secondary level; however the materials may also be suitable for use with older secondary children. 

These resources were produced under the funding of the 7th framework programme, as part of ENGINEER project, contract № 288989. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

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Please be aware that resources have been published on the website in the form that they were originally supplied. This means that procedures reflect general practice and standards applicable at the time resources were produced and cannot be assumed to be acceptable today. Website users are fully responsible for ensuring that any activity, including practical work, which they carry out is in accordance with current regulations related to health and safety and that an appropriate risk assessment has been carried out.

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Science For Kids: The Huff And Puff Challenge

“I will huff and I will puff, and I will blow your house in” said the wolf to the three little pigs. Attention all little scientists! In this simple science experiment, you can huff and puff all you want but you will find it hard to be able to blow a piece of paper. No? You think you’re up for the challenge? Get ready to huff and puff with all you got!

Name : Huff Puff Challenge

Concept:  The power of air pressure

Materials required:

• An Empty Bottle
• Tissue paper
• Take any empty bottle
• Crumple a small piece of tissue paper and rest it loosely inside the mouth of the bottle
• Place the bottle on its side horizontally
• Now blow in with all your might
• Try to make the ball of paper go INSIDE the bottle

Observation:

Try blowing hard or soft, but chances are that the paper ball will fly outside.

Conclusion:

It is very simple why this happens. Although we see that the bottle is “empty,” it’s actually full to the brim with AIR. (Remember: Air is invisible but takes up space and exerts force). So when we blow into the bottle, some of the inside air must come out. The escaping air brings the paper ball out with it.

Hope your little one enjoyed this simple challenge. You can also have fun science time with your family and friends with this experiment.

Gauri Parulkar is founder of  Science Quotient , an activity lab where science is taught via fun and easy to learn experiments. She believes her effort of making science fun for children will help them develop a lifelong love for the subject. A strong advocate of STEM in education, she spends time gardening and drinking copious amounts of tea when she is not thinking of a new way of teaching kids about science.

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Experimental Investigation of the CO 2 Huff and Puff Effect in Low-Permeability Sandstones with NMR

Jinsheng zhao.

† Shaanxi Key Laboratory of Advanced Stimulation Technology for Oil & Gas Reservoirs, Xi’an Shiyou University, Xi’an 710065, P. R. China

‡ School of Petroleum Engineering, Xi’an Shiyou University, Xi’an 710065, P. R. China

Pengfei Wang

§ National Engineering Laboratory of Low-Permeability Oil & Gas Exploration and Development, PetroChina Changqing Oilfield Company, Xi’an 710021, P. R. China

∥ Oil and Gas Technology Research Institute, PetroChina Changqing Oilfield Company, Xi’an 710021, P. R. China

⊥ No. 6 Oil Production Plant, PetroChina Changqing Oilfield Company, Xi’an 710200, P. R. China

For low-permeability sandstone reservoirs, CO 2 huff and puff is an effective method for increasing oil recovery. Commonly, sandstone formations with low permeability have diverse pore and throat sizes and a complex pore-throat structure, which essentially affects the flow characteristics of CO 2 and oil in the formation and further the CO 2 huff and puff performance. It is necessary to understand the recovery degree of various microscale pore sizes under different operational parameters during CO 2 huff and puff in tight sandstones. In this work, several experiments of cyclic CO 2 injection are conducted with sandstone core samples with low permeability. Before and after the injection, the T 2 spectra of the sandstone cores are compared using the NMR technique. We then discuss the micro residual oil distribution and recovery degree in different pores, such as micropores (<1 ms), small pores (1–10 ms), medium pores (10–100 ms), and macropores (>100 ms). It is found that the recovery degree in the different pores increases as the pore size increases. Oil can be recovered more easily from macropores and medium pores during the cyclic CO 2 injection. The oil contained in micropores is relatively difficult to extract considering a high capillary force under immiscible conditions. It is found that the total recovery degree increases with the increase in soaking time. However, such a recovery degree increment in small pores is not as large as that achieved in medium and large pores. With the CO 2 injection volume increase, the total recovery degree increases. When the CO 2 injection volume is less than 1.5 PV, it is challenging to extract the oil from micropores and small pores. As the cycle number increases, the cyclic oil recovery decreases, and most of the oil is produced in the first cycle. This suggests that under the experimental conditions of this study, the cycle number of CO 2 huff and puff shall not be more than 3. This work is important to further understand the CO 2 huff and puff process for improving oil recovery in sandstone reservoirs with low permeability.

1. Introduction

To decrease the CO 2 emissions and greenhouse effect, numerous efforts have been made on carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS). 1 − 4 On the other hand, to replenish formation energy, low-permeability reservoirs are usually developed by water injection or gas injection. 5 , 6 CO 2 injection can increase oil production by oil expansion, reducing oil–water interfacial tension and oil viscosity, and light hydrocarbon extraction from oil. 7 , 8 Therefore, for low-permeability reservoirs, CO 2 injection has been recognized as an effective method for enhancing oil recovery. 9 , 10 The methods of CO 2 injection for enhancing oil recovery include CO 2 flooding, CO 2 huff and puff, and CO 2 –water alternate injection. 2 As for a single well, CO 2 huff and puff is more workable and practical taking into account the low cost with a high return feature. 7 , 11 Pore and throat sizes of tight sandstone formations are typically on the micro- and nanoscale combined with complex pore-throat structure, which significantly impacts the production degree in different pores and throats during CO 2 huff and puff. Hence, the study of the remaining oil distribution in different pores is helpful to understand the mechanisms of CO 2 huff and puff in sandstone reservoirs with low permeability.

Numerous works have been done to study the injection parameters that affect the performance of cyclic CO 2 injection, 12 − 15 including soaking time, injection volume, injection mode, injection pressure, etc. Kong et al. probed and analyzed the performance of water flooding and CO 2 huff and puff in a tight oil reservoir. The results showed that the length of the gas injection stage and production stage can impose a greater influence on the cyclic CO 2 injection performance compared with the soaking time in each cycle. 16 Firouz and Torabi experimentally investigated the influence of the shut-in time on the effect of the CO 2 huff and puff. A long soaking time can effectively increase the recovery degree of the first cycle; however, it cannot noticeably increase the ultimate oil recovery. 17 Wang et al. optimized the injection parameters and found that the optimum injection time and soaking time are 1 year and 30 days, respectively. 18 Zhang et al. found that the main factors affecting the CO 2 huff and puff effect include CO 2 injection volume, permeability, and stress sensitivity. 19 Song and Yang evaluated field-scale CO 2 huff and puff performance in the Bakken reservoir. This study suggested that a high injection pressure or a low production pressure usually results in better recovery performance, while the maximum recovery degree can be achieved under the condition of soaking time of 15 days. 20

Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) technology is usually utilized to test the distribution of fluid containing hydrogen in a porous medium. When the fluid containing hydrogen is placed in a porous medium, the hydrogen nucleus in the fluid makes a movement of transverse relaxation. 21 , 22 The larger the pore size, the longer the corresponding transverse relaxation time ( T 2 ). 23 , 24 Therefore, the T 2 spectrum distribution also indicates the pore size distribution, and the NMR technique can be used to determine the pore size distribution. 25 − 27 Several researchers have conducted analyses to better understand the performance of CO 2 huff and puff on the microscale through NMR techniques. 28 − 30 Wei et al. discussed the oil distribution in the matrix and fractures of cores with a low-field NMR measurement. The results demonstrated that the produced oil was initially from large pores with a T 2 value from 3.0 to 100 ms. 28 Ma and Bai applied the NMR technique to analyze the residual oil distribution in different pores. It was found that the produced oil is mainly from large and medium pores for the first cycle. In the succeeding cycles, the remaining oil is generally produced from the smaller pores and micropores. 29 − 32 For CO 2 huff and puff in low-permeability sandstone reservoirs, although previous studies have investigated the oil recovery degree from different pore sizes, the change of the pore size range where the oil is produced at different operation parameters such as injection pressure, injection volume, and soaking time is not yet systematically investigated, which, nevertheless, is crucial to understand the process of cyclic CO 2 injection for increasing oil recovery in sandstone formations with low permeability.

In this study, the NMR technique is employed to investigate the CO 2 huff and puff effect at different operation parameters such as soaking time, injection volume, and cycle numbers. According to comparison of the T 2 spectrum before and after CO 2 huff and puff, the residual oil saturation and recovery factor in different pores are discussed. This paper aims to investigate the process of CO 2 huff and puff as an efficient method to improve oil recovery in tight formations.

2. Experiment and Methods

2.1. materials.

The seven sandstone cores used for the study are from the Chang 8 reservoir of the Heshui oilfield in China. Table 1 gives the core sizes, rock properties, and experimental parameters. The experimental oil is made up of degassed crude oil and kerosene in a volume ratio of 1:3. The viscosity and density of the oil are 2.16 mPa·s and 0.8 g/cm 3 at 323.15 K, respectively. The water used to saturate the cores has MnCl 2 with a mass concentration of 25 000 mg/L; the hydrogen content is eliminated in the liquid. The purity of the CO 2 used in the experiment is 99.99 mol %, and the minimum miscibility pressure (MMP) at 323.15 K is measured to be 17.5 MPa.

2.2. Experimental Setup

Figure ​ Figure1 1 presents the flow chart of the CO 2 huff and puff experiment. NMR equipment (Geo spec2/53, Oxford, England) is applied to measure the T 2 spectrum of the sandstone cores. An ISCO pump (A100DX, Teledyne ISCO) is used to inject fluid into the cores with an accuracy of 0.5% of the set flow rate. A manual pump (Hongbo Co. Ltd., China) is used to maintain the confinement pressure of the cores. The measured data of flow rate and pressure are recorded by a data collection system.

Flow chart of the cyclic CO 2 injection experiment.

2.3. Experimental Steps

The cyclic CO 2 injection experiment in the sandstone cores is first conducted. The recovery factors and residual oil saturations for different pore sizes are compared by analyzing the T 2 spectrum before and after CO 2 huff and puff. The following experimental steps are taken:

• (1) The seven cores are completely cleaned using benzene to remove the oil contained in the cores.
• (2) The cleaned cores are dried at 363.15 K for 12 h to remove the residual benzene and moisture.
• (3) The dried cores are measured for permeability and then saturated with MnCl 2 aqueous solution.
• (4) The cores saturated with MnCl 2 solution are saturated with oil by displacing water.
• (5) NMR equipment is then applied to measure the T 2 spectrum of the cores saturated with oil. Through analyzing the measured T 2 spectrum, the initial oil distribution in different pore sizes can be obtained.
• (6)Then, the CO 2 huff and puff experiment is conducted. First, the core holder outlet is closed, and then the core is injected with CO 2 at a rate of 0.1 mL/min until the injected volume reaches the volume shown in Table 1 . Then, the core holder inlet is closed, and the core is aged for a soaking time also shown in Table 1 . After that, the core holder inlet is opened, and the oil is produced. During the cyclic CO 2 injection of every core, injection pressure and cycle number are set as given in Table 1 . The experimental temperature is kept constant at 50 °C.

• where R represents the recovery factor after the cyclic CO 2 injection; S o means the area covered by the original T 2 spectrum and X -axis before the CO 2 huff and puff; and S is the area covered by the T 2 spectrum and X -axis after CO 2 huff and puff.
• (8) Comparing and analyzing the T 2 spectra before and after the cyclic CO 2 injection for the oil in the cores, the remaining oil saturation in various pore sizes can be obtained and is discussed.

3. Results and Discussion

3.1. influence of soaking time on the oil recovery factor.

To determine the true pore size, a core sample from the same area is selected for the mercury injection test and NMR test. The test results are shown in Figures ​ Figures2 2 and ​ and3. 3 . The corresponding values of the peak values of the two curves are 0.4 μm and 58.73 ms. The division of the two values determines that the conversion coefficient of the pore radius and T 2 value is 0.007.

Pore radius distribution of core #0 tested by the mercury injection experiment.

T 2 spectrum distribution of core #0 tested by NMR.

Figures ​ Figures4 4 – 6 show the T 2 spectrum distributions of cores #1, #2, and #3 before and after the cyclic CO 2 injection with soaking times of 5, 10, and 15 h, respectively. According to the common classification method based on transverse relaxation time, the pores of the cores are classified into four groups, i.e., micropores (diameter smaller than 1 ms), small pores (diameter between 1 and 10 ms), medium pores (diameter between 10 and 100 ms), and large pores (>100 ms). The true pore size of micropores, small pores, medium pores, and large pores is 0–0.007, 0.007–0.07, 0.07–0.7, and >0.7 μm respectively.

T 2 spectrum distribution of core #1, with a 5 h soaking time.

T 2 spectrum distribution of core #3, with a15 h soaking time.

T 2 spectrum distribution of core #2, with a 10 h soaking time.

Table 2 gives the oil saturations before and after one CO 2 huff and puff cycle with different soaking times. The recovery factors of the pore sizes are calculated based on eq 1 and shown in Table 3 .

As can be seen in Table 2 , the pore sizes of the three cores are mainly in the range of micropores and small pores, and around 60–80% of oil is contained in micropores and small pores. After the first cycle, the percentage of the remaining oil distributed in the micropores and small pores further increases to more than 90%, while the oil in the medium pores and large pores is less than 10%. In other words, the oil in the large and medium pores is easily extracted at the three soaking times compared to that in the micro and small pores. As shown in Figures ​ Figures4 4 – 6 , the area covered by the T 2 spectrum curves of the three cores after CO 2 huff and puff is found to decline to varying degrees compared with the initial T 2 spectrum. However, there is a large difference of the area decreases occurring in the pores with different sizes. It can be observed that a large pore size and a long soaking time will lead to a great decline of areas covered by the T 2 spectrum, i.e., a high recovery degree of the oil. This indicates that both the soaking time and pore size can affect the CO 2 huff and puff performance. Table 3 further summarizes the calculated recovery factor in the pores with different sizes. One can find that the value of the recovery factor is strongly dependent on the pore size and gradually increases with an increase in the soaking time. However, compared with the soaking time, pore size is definitely the main factor that determines the recovery factor. It can be seen that although the soaking time of core #3 is three times as long as that of core #1, the recovery factor (12.01%) of micropores of core #3 is still less than 1/2 of the recovery factor (26.37%) of small pores of core #1, not to mention that the permeability of the former is higher than that of the latter. That is to say, a long soaking time cannot achieve a high increment of the recovery factor of the oil contained in micropores. As for the macropores, the recovery factor of core #1 is larger than those of cores #2 and #3, which is because the pore size of macropores in core #1 is much larger than those of cores #2 and #3.

It should be noted that with a longer soaking time, the total recovery factor of core #3 has a noticeable improvement compared with that of core #2. According to the original T 2 spectrum distributions of the three cores ( Figures ​ Figures4 4 – 6 ), it is found that the left peak value of the T 2 spectrum of core #3 is higher and the span between two peaks is shorter compared with those of cores #1 and #2, which usually means a relatively homogeneous pore size and leads to a better pore-throat connectivity in core #3. Thereby, in addition to a longer soaking time, a better pore-throat connectivity possibly is a reason accounting for the high recovery degree of core #3 after CO 2 huff and puff.

3.2. Influence of Injection Volume on the CO 2 Huff and Puff Effect

Figures ​ Figures7 7 – 9 show the T 2 spectrum distribution of cores #4, #5, and #6 before and after CO 2 huff and puff with CO 2 injection volumes of 1.0, 1.5, and 2.0 PV, respectively. With the increase in CO 2 injection volume, the decline in the area covered by the T 2 spectrum after CO 2 huff and puff increases, which means that the volume of the produced oil increases. When the injection volumes are 1.0 and 1.5 PV, the produced oil of cores #4 and #5 after CO 2 huff and puff can be observed to be mainly from medium pores and macropores. When the injection volume is increased to 2.0 PV, a large amount of oil is produced from all pores of the core, which includes micropores, small pores, medium pores, and macropores in core #6. Especially, the recovery factor of different pore sizes is in the range of 30.44–85.29% ( Table 4 ). This is likely attributed to the fact that with the increase of the CO 2 injection volume, more CO 2 can intrude into the micropores and small pores, which is conducive to mass transfer between CO 2 and oil and further extract more produced oil from the micropores and small pores due mainly to a lowered interfacial tension and viscosity. In addition, the pressure in the core will increase with the increase in CO 2 injection volume and then cause an increase in the solubility of CO 2 in the crude oil similarly, which will be beneficial to improve the total recovery factor after CO 2 huff and puff. According to the results of the three cores, it is difficult to produce the oil from micropores and small pores under the conditions of 323.15 K and 7.0 MP, when the CO 2 injection volume is less than 1.5 PV.

T 2 spectrum distribution of core #4 with an injection volume of 1 PV.

T 2 spectrum distribution of core #6 with an injection volume of 2.0 PV.

T 2 spectrum distribution of core #5 with an injection volume of 1.5 PV.

3.3. Influence of Cycle Numbers on the CO 2 Huff and Puff Effect

Figure ​ Figure10 10 shows the T 2 spectrum distribution of core #7 before and after CO 2 huff and puff with different cycle numbers. The microscale recovery factors of different pore sizes after every CO 2 huff and puff cycle are calculated and shown in Figure ​ Figure11 11 . As can be seen in Figure ​ Figure10 10 , the T 2 spectrum after CO 2 huff and puff declines to a certain extent after each CO 2 huff and puff cycle. However, the decline becomes gradually smaller. In other words, with the progress of CO 2 huff and puff, oil is continuously produced in the core, and the oil produced by a subsequent cycle of CO 2 huff and puff under the same operating conditions decreases. As shown in Figure ​ Figure9 9 , for the first cycle, the larger the pore diameter, the more the oil produced, and the corresponding cyclic oil recovery is from 21.8% of micropores to 89.22% of macropores. After the second cycle of CO 2 huff and puff, all of the remaining oil in the macropores has been extracted, and the oil recovery factors of the micropores, small pores, and medium pores gradually increase and reach 16.63, 19.55, and 22.62%, respectively. However, in the third cycle, the cyclic oil recovery in all grades of pores, i.e., micropores, small pores, and medium pores, decreased sharply to less than 10%. It can be inferred that if there are more than three cycles of CO 2 huff and puff, the corresponding cyclic oil recovery rate will be lower. Thereby, under the experimental conditions of this study (see Table 1 ), the cycle number of CO 2 huff and puff is recommended to be less than 3.

T 2 spectrum distribution of core #7 with different cycle numbers.

Recovery factor of core #7 in various pore sizes with different cycle numbers.

4. Conclusions

The performance of CO 2 huff and puff with different soaking times, injection volumes, and cycle numbers is experimentally investigated using the NMR technique in low-permeability sandstone cores. According to the measured T 2 spectrum before and after cyclic CO 2 injection, the microscale recovery factors for micropores, small pores, medium pores, and macropores are compared. The conclusions drawn are as follows.

• The recovery factor in different pore sizes of the cyclic CO 2 injection is positively correlated with the pore size. Oil in the micropores (<1 ms) is relatively difficult to produce compared with that in macropores and medium pores under immiscible conditions.
• After one CO 2 huff and puff cycle, with the increase in soaking time, the total recovery factor increases to 29.23, 38.30, and 54.84%. The produced oil is observed to be mainly from macropores and medium pores; the increased recovery in micropores is limited depending only on increasing the soaking time.
• With the increase in CO 2 injection volume, the pressure in the core increases, which can be beneficial to improve the total recovery degree after CO 2 huff and puff. Based on the experiments of this work, it is difficult to produce oil from micropores and small pores when the CO 2 injection volume is less than 1.5 PV.
• Comparing the T 2 spectrum distribution before and after a three-cycle CO 2 huff and puff, most of the oil is produced in the first cycle. As for the third cycle of CO 2 huff and puff, the cyclic oil recovery degree in all pores is less than 10%. This suggests that the cycle number of CO 2 huff and puff shall not be more than 3 under the experimental conditions of this work.

Acknowledgments

This research was supported by the Science and Technology Plan Project of Shaanxi Province (No. 2021JM-411), the Postgraduate Innovation and Practical Ability Cultivation Plan (No. YCS20211003), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 51774236), and the Youth Innovation Team of Shaanxi Universities.

The authors declare no competing financial interest.

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The Three Little Pigs House Experiment

Subject: Expressive arts and design

Age range: 3 - 7

Resource type: Worksheet/Activity

Last updated

20 September 2018

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I WILL HUFF AND PUFF AND BLOW YOUR HOUSE DOWN!

Pack complete with three different design sheets for children to complete before building their houses, as well as two decorative speech bubbles to be framed in the classroom, or cut out and laminated to further support the story.

Have fun, The Teacher Traveller

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