University of the Punjab Conference Portal, 6th Symposium on Engineering Sciences

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Foaming surfactant formulation for CO2 mobility control for Enhanced Oil Recovery applications
Dr. Muhammad Sagir

Last modified: 2016-11-02

Abstract


 

The efficiency of the CO2 in trapped oil mobilization process is severely effects by many problems including gravity override, viscous fingering, and early breakthrough. The said problems can efficiently be reduced by foaming agents.

 A study has been conducted to evaluate CO2 philic surfactants which have exhibited more practical advantages over conventional surfactants. The interfacial tension (IFT) between neat CO2 and the newly produced surfactant solution was examined and is reported. By using the surfactant in 0.5 % concentration It was observed that the CO2/ water IFT appreciably decreased from 30 mN/m to 2.41 mN/m.The static foam durability experiments in 1000 ml cylinder and by using foam analyzer at high temperature (95 0C) in the presence and absence of the Dulang crude oil were conducted and are reported. The adsorption of surfactant formulation was investigated and was found 0.91 mg/g. The Coreflood experiment were also conducted to measure the mobility  reduction factor (MRF) and was found 3.3. In addition, 94 % oil recovery was achieved by conducting high pressure high temperature (HPHT) coreflood experiments by using Berea core sample by using the new CO2 philic surfactant. 

The results showed that as compared to conventional surfactants, CO2 philic surfactants significantly reduce the mobility of the injected CO2 and can recover additional trapped oil.