Experimental investigation into effects of the natural polymer and nanoclay particles on the EOR performance of chemical flooding in carbonate reservoirs

This paper aims to investigate the tragacanth gum potential as a natural polymer combined with natural clay mineral(montmorillonite,kaolinite,and illite)nanoparticles(NPs)to form NP-polymer suspension for enhanced oil recovery(EOR)in carbonate reservoirs.Thermal gravimetric analysis(TGA)tests were conducted initially in order to evaluate the properties of tragacanth gum.Subsequently,scanning electron microscopy(SEM)and energy-dispersive X-ray(EDX)tests were used to detect the structure of clay particles.In various scenarios,the effects of natural NPs and polymer on the wettability alteration,interfacial tension(IFT)reduction,viscosity improvement,and oil recovery were investigated through contact angle system,ring method,Anton Paar viscometer,and core flooding tests,respectively.The entire experiment was conducted at 25,50,and 75℃,respectively.According to the experimental results,the clay minerals alone did not have a significant effect on viscosity,but the addition of minerals to the polymer solution leads to the viscosity enhancement remarkably,resulting mobility ratio improvement.Among clay NPs,the combination of natural polymer and kaolinite results in increased viscosity at all temperatures.Considerable wettability alteration was also observed in the case of natural polymer and illite NPs.Illite in combination with natural polymer showed an ability in reducing IFT.Finally,the results of displacement experiments revealed that the combination of natural polymer and kaolinite could be the best option for EOR due to its substantial ability to improve the recovery factor.

Layered injection technology for chemical flooding of Class-Ⅲ oil reservoirs in the Daqing Oil Fields complex,Songliao Basin,Northeast China

The Class-Ⅲ oil reservoirs of Lasaxing oilfield in the Daqing Oil Fields complex have geological oil reserves of 1.86 billion tonnes,an oil recovery of 39%,with remaining reserves accounting for more than 45%of the total geological reserves of the oilfield.Therefore,they have considerable potential for future oil production.The current layered injection technologies fail to achieve effective control over the low single-layer injection rates since they can only produce low throttle differential pressure under low injection rates(5-20 m^(3)/d).In this study,a symmetrically-structured double-offset-hole injection allocator and a novel throttling component were developed.Their spatial layout was constructed and mechanical parameters were optimized using finite element analysis,which allows for expanding the flow rate range at low injection rates.According to experimental results,the throttle differential pressure increased from 0.2 MPa to 0.8 MPa at an injection rate of 5 m^(3)/d,and the range of the single-layer flow rates expanded from 20-70 m^(3)/d to 5-70 m3/d.The field test results show that the effective production of oil layers with medium and low permeability was achieved and that the ratio of producing oil layer thickness to the total reservoir thickness increased by 9.7%on average.Therefore,this study provides valuable technical support for the effective chemical-flooding-based development of Class-Ⅲ oil reservoirs.

Dissipative particle dynamics simulation of wettability alternation phenomena in the chemical flooding process

Wettability alternation phenomena is considered one of the most important enhanced oil recovery （EOR） mechanisms in the chemical flooding process and induced by the adsorption of surfactant on the rock surface. These phenomena are studied by a mesoscopic method named as dissipative particle dynamics （DPD）. Both the alteration phenomena of water-wet to oil-wet and that of oil-wet to water-wet are simulated based on reasonable definition of interaction parameters between beads. The wetting hysteresis phenomenon and the process of oil-drops detachment from rock surfaces with different wettability are simulated by adding long-range external forces on the fluid particles. The simulation results show that, the oil drop is liable to spread on the oil-wetting surface and move in the form of liquid film flow, whereas it is likely to move as a whole on the waterwetting surface. There are the same phenomena occuring in wettability-alternated cases. The results also show that DPD method provides a feasible approach to the problems of seepage flow with physicochemical phenomena and can be used to study the mechanism of EOR of chemical flooding.

Numerical simulation of pore-scale flow in chemical flooding process

Chemical flooding is one of the effective technologies to increase oil recovery of petroleum reservoirs after water flooding.Above the scale of representative elementary volume(REV), phenomenological modeling and numerical simulations of chemical flooding have been reported in literatures,but the studies alike are rarely conducted at the pore-scale,at which the effects of physicochemical hydrodynamics are hardly resolved either by experimental observations or by traditional continuum-based simulations.In this paper,dissipative particle dynamics(DPD),one of mesoscopic fluid particle methods,is introduced to simulate the pore-scale flow in chemical flooding processes.The theoretical background,mathematical formulation and numerical approach of DPD are presented.The plane Poiseuille flow is used to illustrate the accuracy of the DPD simulation,and then the processes of polymer flooding through an oil-wet throat and a water-wet throat are studies, respectively.The selected parameters of those simulations are given in details.These preliminary results show the potential of this novel method for modeling the physicochemical hydrodynamics at the pore scale in the area of chemical enhanced oil recovery.

PREPARATION,IDENTIFICATION AND INTERFACIAL ACTIVITIES OF PETROLEUM CARBOXYLATE AS SURFACTANT FOR CHEMICAL FLOODING

Petroleum carboxylate that may be suitable for tertiary oil recovery have been produced inexpensively from the fractions of Daqing crude oil by a two step process.The feed stock was first oxidized in the vapor phase,followed by reaction of the oxidized products with sodium hydroxide.Dilute solutions of sodium carboxylates were produced and show ultralow(10^(-2)mN/m)interfacial tensions(IFTs)against a variety of hydrocarbons with a wide range of ACN(Alkane Carbon Number).Infrared spectroscopy was used to identify the functional groups in the oxidized and the saponified products.

Treatment of Oil Field Wastewater after Chemical Flooding by Fenton Oxidation Combined with Biodegradation

Wastewater after chemical flooding is difficult to be treated by biological methods due to the residual chemicals in the wastewater. Fenton oxidation, which has been widely applied to detoxifying hazardous organic compounds and improving the biodegradability of these compounds, can solve this problem. So, in this paper, Fenton oxidation was used to enhance the biodegradability of the wastewater after chemical flooding. The op- timum operating conditions for the Fenton oxidation process were 2.5 g/L Fe2 ＋ , 600 mg/L H202 and 30 rain of treatment time. The wastewater pre- treated by Fenton oxidation was treated by aerobic activated sludge. It was found that a small amount of H202 can significantly increase both the biodegradation rate and extent of the wastewater. The effluent CODc, and HPAM contents were 260 and 94 mg/L respectively after the aerobic bio- logical process with the biodegradation time of 24 h. After Fenton oxidation combining with biodegradation, the total CODc, removal efficiency was up to 90%, and polymer and oil degrading efficiencies were 95% and 92% respectively.

Feasibility Study on Chemical Flooding in Super High Porosity and Permeability Heavy Oil Reservoir

In this paper, the feasibility study of chemical flooding is carried out for ultra-high porosity and high permeability heavy oil field with permeability higher than 10 μm2 and porosity greater than 35%. The viscosity-concentration relationship of four kinds of oil flooding systems such as hydrolyzed polyacrylamide, structural polymer A, structural polymer B and gel was studied. The results showed that the viscosity of ordinary polymer and structural polymer B was lower compared with other two types of oil displacement agents, and the viscosity of structural polymer A was higher. The higher the concentration, the higher the viscosity retention rate. The gel system has the highest viscosity and best anti-shear ability. The resistance coefficient and residual resistance coefficient of structural polymer A and gel system were further studied. The results show that permeability, velocity and polymer concentration all affect the resistance coefficient and residual resistance coefficient. From the point of view of resistance establishment ability, it is considered that structural polymer A is not suitable for permeability formation above 10 μm2. Gel system has stronger ability to establish resistance coefficient than structural polymer A flooding system, and it is more feasible for formation system with permeability above 10 μm2.

Impact of solutal Marangoni convection on oil recovery during chemical flooding

In this study,the impacts of solutal Marangoni phenomenon on multiphase flow in static and micromodel geometries have experimentally been studied and the interactions between oil droplet and two different alkaline solutions(i.e.MgS04 and Na_2 CO_3) were investigated.The static tests revealed that the Marangoni convection exists in the presence of the alkaline and oil which should carefully be considered in porous media.In the micromodel experiments,observations showed that in the MgS04 flooding,the fluids stayed almost stationary,while in the Na2 C03 flooding,a spontaneous movement was detected.The changes in the distribution of fluids showed that the circular movement of fluids due to the Marangoni effects can be effective in draining of the unswept regions.The dimensional analysis for possible mechanisms showed that the viscous,gravity and diffusion forces were negligible and the other mechanisms such as capillary and Marangoni effects should be considered in the investigated experiments.The value of the new defined Marangoni/capillary dimensionless number for the Na2 C03 solution was orders of magnitude larger than the MgS04 flooding scenario which explains the differences between the two cases and also between different micromodel regions.In conclusion,the Marangoni convection is activated by creating an ultra-low IFT condition in multiphase flow problems that can be profoundly effective in increasing the phase mixing and microscopic efficiency.

Production calculation of the second and tertiary recovery combination reservoirs under chemical flooding

Based on the analysis of the production composition of reservoirs developed by the second&tertiary recovery combination(STRC),the relationship between the overall output of the STRC project and the production level during the blank water flooding stage is proposed.According to the basic principle of reservoir engineering that the“recovery factor is equal to sweeping coefficient multiplied by oil displacement efficiency”,the formula for calculating the ultimate oil recovery factor of chemical combination flooding reservoir was established.By dividing the reservoir into a series of grids according to differen-tial calculus thinking,the relationship between the ultimate recovery factor of a certain number of grids and the recovery de-gree of the reservoir was established,and then the variation law of oil production rate of the STRC reservoir was obtained.The concept of“oil rate enlargement factor of chemical combination flooding”was defined,and a production calculation method of reservoir developed by STRC was put forward based on practical oilfield development experience.The study shows that the oil production enhancing effect of STRC increases evenly with the in crease of the ratio of STRC displacement efficiency to water displacement efficiency,and increases rapidly with the increase of the ratio of recovery degree at flooding mode conversion to the water displacement efficiency.STRC is more effective in increasing oil production of reservoir with high recovery degree.Through practical tests of the alkali free binary flooding(polymer/surfactant)projects,the relative error of the oil production calculation method of STRC reservoir is about±10%,which meets the requirements of reservoir engineering.

A predictive model of chemical flooding for enhanced oil recovery purposes:Application of least square support vector machine

Applying chemical flooding in petroleum reservoirs turns into interesting subject of the recent researches.Developing strategies of the aforementioned method are more robust and precise when they consider both economical point of views(net present value(NPV))and technical point of views(recovery factor(RF)).In the present study huge attempts are made to propose predictive model for specifying efficiency of chemical flooding in oil reservoirs.To gain this goal,the new type of support vector machine method which evolved by Suykens and Vandewalle was employed.Also,high precise chemical flooding data banks reported in previous works were employed to test and validate the proposed vector machine model.According to the mean square error(MSE),correlation coefficient and average absolute relative deviation,the suggested LSSVM model has acceptable reliability;integrity and robustness.Thus,the proposed intelligent based model can be considered as an alternative model to monitor the efficiency of chemical flooding in oil reservoir when the required experimental data are not available or accessible.

Investigation of feasibility of alkali-cosolvent flooding in heavy oil reservoirs

Cold production is a challenge in the case of heavy oil because of its high viscosity and poor fluidity in reservoir conditions.Alkali-cosolvent-polymer flooding is a type of microemulsion flooding with low costs and possible potential for heavy oil reservoirs.However,the addition of polymer may cause problems with injection in the case of highly viscous oil.Hence,in this study the feasibility of alkali-cosolvent(AC)flooding in heavy oil reservoirs was investigated via several groups of experiments.The interfacial tension between various AC formulations and heavy crude oil was measured to select appropriate formulations.Phase behavior tests were performed to determine the most appropriate formulation and conditions for the generation of a microemulsion.Sandpack flooding experiments were carried out to investigate the displacement efficiency of the selected Ac formulation.The results showed that the interfacial tension between an AC formulation and heavy oil could be reduced to below 1o-3 mN/m but differed greatly between different types of cosolvent.A butanol random polyether series displayed good performance in reducing the water-oil interfacial tension,which made it possible to form a Type Il microemulsion in reservoir conditions.According to the results of the phase behavior tests,the optimal salinity for different formulations with four cosolvent concentrations(0.5 wt%,1 wt%,2 wt%,and 3 wt%)was 4000,8000,14000,and 20000 ppm,respectively.The results of rheological measurements showed that Type Ill microemulsion had a viscosity that was ten times that of water.The results of sandpack flooding experiments showed that,in comparison with waterflooding,the injection of a certain Ac formulation slug could reduce the injection pressure.The pressure gradient during waterflooding and AC flooding was around 870 and 30-57 kPa/m,respectively.With the addition of an AC slug,the displacement efficiency was 30%-50%higher than in the case of waterflooding.

Process, mechanism and impacts of scale formation in alkaline flooding by a variable porosity and permeability model

In spite of the role of alkali in enhancing oil recovery（EOR）, the formation of precipitation during alkaline-surfactant-polymer（ASP） flooding can severely do harm to the stratum of oil reservoirs, which has been observed in situ tests of oil fields such as scale deposits found in oil stratum and at the bottom of oil wells. On the other hand,remarkable variation of stratum parameters, e.g., pore radius,porosity, and permeability due to scale formation considerably affects seepage flow and alkaline flooding process in return. The objective of this study is to firstly examine these mutual influential phenomena and corresponding mechanisms along with EOR during alkaline flooding when the effects of precipitation are no longer negligible. The chemical kinetic theory is applied for the specific fundamental reactions to describe the process of rock dissolution in silicabased reservoirs. The solubility product principle is used to analyze the mechanism of alkali scale formation in flooding.Then a 3D alkaline flooding coupling model accounting for the variation of porosity and permeability is established to quantitatively estimate the impact of alkali scales on reservoir stratum. The reliability of the present model is verified in comparison with indoor experiments and field tests of the Daqing oil field. Then, the numerical simulations on a 1/4well group in a 5-spot pattern show that the precipitation grows with alkali concentration, temperature, and injection pressure and, thus, reduces reservoir permeability and oil recovery correspondingly. As a result, the selection of alkaliwith a weak base is preferable in ASP flooding by tradeoff strategy.

Micro-mechanisms of residual oil mobilization by viscoelastic fluids

Four typical types of residual oil, residual oil trapped in dead ends, oil ganglia in pore throats, oil at pore corners and oil film adhered to pore walls, were studied. According to main pore structure characteristics and the fundamental morphological features of residual oil, four displacement models for residual oil were proposed, in which pore-scale flow behavior of viscoelastic fluid was analyzed by a numerical method and micro-mechanisms for mobilization of residual oil were discussed. Calculated results indicate that the viscoelastic effect enhances micro displacement efficiency and increases swept volume. For residual oil trapped in dead ends, the flow field of viscoelastic fluid is developed in dead ends more deeply, resulting in more contact with oil by the displacing fluid, and consequently increasing swept volume. In addition, intense viscoelastic vortex has great stress, under which residual oil becomes small oil ganglia, and finally be carried into main channels. For residual oil at pore throats, its displacement mechanisms are similar to the oil trapped in dead ends. Vortices are developed in the depths of the throats and oil ganglia become smaller. Besides, viscoelastic fluid causes higher pressure drop on oil ganglia, as a driving force, which can overcome capillary force, consequently, flow direction can be changed and the displacing fluid enter smaller throats. For oil at pore corners, viscoelastic fluid can enhance displacement efficiency as a result of greater velocity and stress near the corners. For residual oil adhered to pore wall, viscoelastic fluid can provide a greater displacing force on the interface between viscoelastic fluid and oil, thus, making it easier to exceed the minimum interfacial tension for mobilizing the oil film.

The mechanism of hydraulic fracturing assisted oil displacement to enhance oil recovery in low and medium permeability reservoirs

Aiming at the technology of hydraulic fracturing assisted oil displacement which combines hydraulic fracturing,seepage and oil displacement,an experimental system of energy storage and flowback in fracturing assisted oil displacement process has been developed and used to simulate the mechanism of percolation,energy storage,oil displacement and flowback of chemical agents in the whole process.The research shows that in hydraulic fracturing assisted oil displacement,the chemical agent could be directly pushed to the deeper area of the low and medium permeability reservoirs,avoiding the viscosity loss and adhesion retention of chemical agents near the pay zone;in addition,this technology could effectively enlarge the swept volume,improve the oil displacement efficiency,replenish formation energy,gather and exploit the scattered residual oil.For the reservoir with higher permeability,this measure takes effect fast,so to lower cost,and the high pressure hydraulic fracturing assisted oil displacement could be adopted directly.For the reservoir with lower permeability which is difficult to absorb water,hydraulic fracturing assisted oil displacement with surfactant should be adopted to reduce flow resistance of the reservoir and improve the water absorption capacity and development effect of the reservoir.The degree of formation energy deficit was the main factor affecting the effective swept range of chemical agents.Moreover,the larger the formation energy deficit was,the further the seepage distance of chemical agents was,accordingly,the larger the effective swept volume was,and the greater the increase of oil recovery was.Formation energy enhancement was the most important contribution to enhanced oil recovery(EOR),which was the key to EOR by the technology of hydraulic fracturing assisted oil displacement.

Performance Evaluation of Ionic Liquids Using Numerical Simulation

Given the rise in oil productivity from conventional and unconventional resources in Canada using Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR), the need to understand and characterize these techniques, for the purpose of recovery optimization, has taken a prominent role in resource management. Chemical flooding has proved to be one of the most efficient EOR techniques. This study investigated the potential of employing Ionic Liquids (ILs) as alternative chemical agents for improving oil recovery. There is very little attention paid to employing this technique as well as few experimental and simulation studies. Consequently, very limited data are available. Since pilot and field studies are relatively expensive and time consuming, a numerical simulation study using CMG-STARS simulator was utilized to explore the efficiency of employing 1-Ethyl-3-Methyl-Imidazolium Acetate ([EMIM][Ac]) and 1-Benzyl-3-meth- limidazolium chloride ([BenzMIM][Cl]) with respect to improving medium oil recovery. Eight different lab-scale sandpack flooding experiments were selected to develop a numerical model to obtain the history matching of the experimental flooding results using CMG-CMOST. We observed that the main challenge was tuning the relative permeability curves to achieve a successful match for the oil recovery factor. Finally, a sensitivity study was performed to examine the effect of the chemical injection rate, the chemical concentration, the slug size, and the initiation time on oil recovery. The results showed a noticeable increase in the oil RF when injecting IL compared to conventional waterflooding.

Laboratory study on efficiency of three calcium carbonate scale inhibitors in the presence of EOR chemicals

Chemical flooding has been widely used in the oil industry since the 1980s for enhanced oil recovery(EOR)process.Previous studies have shown that the effectiveness of calcium carbonate scale inhibitors is affected by many factors,such as water composition,system pressure,temperature,production rates,pH etc.The breakthrough of the EOR chemicals in the production well could also affect scale formation process and interfere with the scale treatment program as well.However,the studies on the impacts of injected EOR chemicals to scale inhibitor performances are very limited.This paper presents the comprehensive laboratory study on the impacts of the EOR chemicals on CaCO3 scale formation and prevention using static bottle and dynamic tube blocking methods.The EOR chemicals used in this study are a combination of surfactants and polymers.Three different types of inhibitors were evaluated:triphosphonate,penta-phosphonate,and polyacrylate based chemicals.Inhibition(%)from the bottle test and minimum effective dose(MED)based on the tube blocking method were determined for each inhibitor at 160
F.Scale precipitates from the bottle tests were also characterized for morphology and polymorphs using environmental scanning electron(ESEM)and X-ray diffraction(XRD)techniques.Results suggest that the performance of scale inhibitors could be substantially affected by the EOR chemicals.In dynamic tube blocking tests,the MED values of inhibitors were increased roughly 10 times with the EOR chemicals.The static bottle tests showed considerable changes under the test conditions.The impact of EOR chemicals were also demonstrated by the remarkable ranges of crystal morphologies,changing from simple aragonite columns to nanorod,distorted spheroid,and flower-like superstructure in the presence of EOR chemicals and inhibitors.

A STREAMLINE-BASED PREDICTIVE MODEL FOR ENHANCED-OIL-RECOVERY POTENTIALITY

A pseudo-three-dimensional model of potentiality prediction is proposed for enhanced oil recovery, based on the streamline method described in this article. The potential distribution of the flow through a porous medium under a complicated boundary condition is solved with the boundary element method. Furthermore, the method for tracing streamlines between injection wells and producing wells is presented. Based on the results, a numerical solution can be obtained by solving the seepage problem of the stream-tube with consideration of different methods of Enhanced Oil Recovery（EOR）. The advantage of the method given in this article is that it can obtain dynamic calculation with different well patterns of any shape by easily considering different physicochemical phenomena having less calculation time and good stability. Based on the uniform theory basis-streamline method, different models, including CO2 miscible flooding, polymer flooding, alkaline/surfactant/polymer flooding and microbial flooding, are established in this article.