PONE-D-24-56808Calculation method for the volume of weak waterflood zones between layers in heterogeneous oil reservoirs under radial flow conditionsPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Zhang,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

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Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

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2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

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3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

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4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

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5. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: Some comments can improve manuscript:

1. The manuscript offers a novel approach by integrating Darcy's law and Buckley-Leverett theory to predict weak waterflood zones. However, a stronger emphasis on how this method significantly differs from or improves upon existing approaches is needed in the introduction and conclusion.

2. While the iterative calculation method is well described, the step-by-step explanation may be overly detailed for readers with a general reservoir engineering background. Consider moving the derivation of equations to an appendix or supplementary materials and providing a summary of the approach in the main text for better readability.

3. The validation section compares the proposed model with numerical simulations, but the results are limited to a single field case. It would strengthen the manuscript to include additional field data or numerical scenarios to test the robustness of the method across various reservoir conditions.

4. The manuscript mentions a relative error of less than 5% between calculated and simulation results. This is impressive, but a detailed discussion of the factors influencing this error (e.g., heterogeneity, capillary forces, etc.) is needed.

5. Figures 4 and 5 (distribution of residual oil at different stages) are informative but could benefit from clearer labels and descriptions. Indicating specific regions of interest, such as high- and low-permeability zones, would enhance interpretability.

6. Table 1 and Table 2 present essential data on weak waterflood zone proportions but lack sufficient explanation. Brief discussions accompanying these tables in the main text would improve their value to readers.

7. The application section suggests that the method can guide reservoir management strategies. However, more concrete examples of how this method could influence operational decisions, such as well placement or EOR (Enhanced Oil Recovery) techniques, would add value

8. The manuscript highlights the use of a Python program for iterative calculations. It would be helpful to include a brief description of the program's inputs, outputs, and usability, possibly in the supplementary materials.

9. The assumptions made in the model, such as neglecting gravity and capillary pressure, are reasonable for simplification but could limit applicability to certain reservoir conditions. Discussing these limitations explicitly would enhance the manuscript's rigor.

10. The text contains occasional grammatical and stylistic errors that could be addressed to improve readability. For example, phrases such as "offers both high accuracy and computational simplicity" are repeated and could be streamlined for conciseness.

11. Several key references are cited to justify the study. However, recent advancements in reservoir modeling, especially those involving machine learning or advanced numerical methods, are missing. Including such references would improve the context of the study. Some studies can be considered as following: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoen.2024.213533

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.watres.2024.122706

https://doi.org/10.46690/ager.2024.11.05

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eswa.2024.123944

Reviewer #2: 1- Title is very simple and it doe es not show the novelty of the study

2- The parameters introduced, such as permeability contrast, viscosity ratios, and flow resistance coefficients, are physically meaningful and relevant to the study of waterflooding in heterogeneous reservoirs. also there is no physical meaning by adding SW or So in the equation without logic.

The use of dimensionless parameters like the flow resistance coefficient and permeability contrast (e.g., 2.4 times) is logical and aligns with standard practices in reservoir engineering.

However, some parameters (e.g., the threshold permeability contrast of 2.4) should be better justified with physical or experimental reasoning rather than being presented as purely numerical results.

3- Provide clearer explanations for why specific thresholds (e.g., 2.4 times permeability contrast) were chosen and their practical implications in field applications.

Ensure that all derived equations and parameters are dimensionally consistent and validated against real-world data.

4-There is no explicit mention of a sensitivity analysis to evaluate how changes in key parameters (e.g., permeability, viscosity, or injection rates) affect the results. This is a critical omission, as sensitivity analysis is essential for understanding the robustness of the proposed method. Present the results of the sensitivity analysis in graphical or tabular form for better visualization.

5- The paper does not clearly discuss the limitations of the proposed method, such as assumptions about incompressible fluids or neglecting capillary and gravitational effects.

6- While numerical simulations are used for validation, there is no mention of field data validation, which would strengthen the credibility of the method.

7-The grammar is generally acceptable, but there are minor issues with sentence structure and word choice that could be improved for clarity. For example:

"The advancing distance of the waterflooding front in the low-permeability layer reveals that..." could be rephrased for better readability. Some sentences are overly long and could be split into shorter, more concise statements.

8- Proofread the manuscript for grammatical errors and awkward phrasing.

9- Use active voice where possible to improve readability (e.g., "We calculated the advancing distance..." instead of "The advancing distance was calculated...").

10- The paper lacks a discussion on the economic feasibility of the proposed methods (e.g., polymer injection vs. profile modification).

11- Figures and tables are referenced but not included in the text, making it difficult to assess their quality and relevance.

12 also they mentioned table 5 but there is not table 45 in the manuscript, same thing for some figures and not existing such as Figure 11.

13- the discussion part is very shallow

Reviewer #3: 1. Some typo errors in the article should be corrected.

2. It is recommended to add some suggestions for future works in this area to improve the conclusion.

3. The Abstract should contain answers to the following questions: What problem was studied, and why is it important? What methods were used? What are the important results? What conclusions can be drawn from the results? What is the novelty of the work, and where does it go beyond previous efforts in the literature? Please include specific and quantitative results in the Abstract while ensuring that it is suitable for a broad audience. References, figures, tables, equations, and abbreviations should be avoided.

4. The "Introduction" section should be impressive and informative. Some relative papers are highly recommended in field of analytical method to improve this section.

Python approach for using homotopy perturbation method to investigate heat transfer problems, Radiative effects on 2D unsteady MHD Al2O3‐water nanofluid flow between squeezing plates: A comparative study using AGM and HPM in Python, Heat transfer analysis of unsteady nanofluid flow between moving parallel plates with magnetic field: Analytical approach, Thermal analysis of Non-Newtonian visco-inelastic fluid MHD flow between rotating disks, Thermal analysis of boundary layer nanofluid flow over the movable plate with internal heat generation, radiation, and viscous dissipation

5. The mathematical equations must be double-checked.

6. The authors should try to give advantages of using their method compared to others.

7. The work does not provide a well-written conclusion section.

8. There is needed to be more physically discussed.

9. You should provide more information about your solution method.

10. In the conclusion and also in the abstract, authors must present their main outcomes in quantitative outcomes.

Reviewer #4: Manuscript: Calculation method for the volume of weak waterflood zones between layers in heterogeneous oil reservoirs under radial flow conditions.

The following comments are recommended for the manuscript and I think it needs the minor revision at this stage:

1- In this paper the water drive front advancement equations was obtained based on Darcy's Law, please calculate the Reynolds number in flow conditions to check whether Darcy's law is valid or not?

2- Please re-check the values of permeability in lines 300-301 on page 12.

3- Please re-check and correct the figures’ number in line 361 on page 14 to the end of manuscript.

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Reviewer #1: Yes:  Hung Vo Thanh

Reviewer #2: Yes:  TAREK AL ARBI GANAT

Reviewer #3: No

Reviewer #4: No

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New calculation model and application research on weak water-flushed zones distribution prediction in radial flow well patterns of heterogeneous oil reservoirs

PONE-D-24-56808R1

Dear Dr. Zhang,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

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Kind regards,

Muhammad Shakaib, PhD

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #3: (No Response)

Reviewer #4: All comments have been addressed

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2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: (No Response)

Reviewer #4: Yes

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3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: (No Response)

Reviewer #4: Yes

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4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: (No Response)

Reviewer #4: Yes

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5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: (No Response)

Reviewer #4: Yes

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6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: (No Response)

Reviewer #3: The authors have responded to my previous comments and revised the manuscript accordingly. I believe it is acceptable for publication in its form.

Reviewer #4: I believe the authors have adequately addressed the issues, and I recommend publishing the manuscript in its current form in the PLOS ONE.

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7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean? ). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy .

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #3: No

Reviewer #4: No

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