Modeling and analysis of fluid rheology effect on sand screen performance

This paper presents a numerical study of the sand retention process over premium square mesh screens, with special reference to the effect of fluid rheology. This is done by the combined approach of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and discrete element method (DEM). The fluid viscosity μ_f is described by the power-law model (μ_f=Kγ̇ⁿ⁻¹), and the fluid drag force is calculated by a recently developed drag correlation. The model, after validation, is used to study the effects of flow behavior index n, consistency index K, and temperature corresponding to specific rheological properties. The numerical results show that the sand production reduces with increasing n or K but increases with increasing temperature. The increase in n or K or decrease in temperature increases the fluid viscosity. Correspondingly, the particle descending velocity magnitudes decrease, and thus the particle concentration increases. Consequently, the particle-particle interactions near pores become stronger, accounting for faster sand retention.