THE APPLICATION OF MICROBIOLOGICALLY ENHANCED OIL RECOVERY TO THE ALTON FIELD, QUEENSLAND, AUSTRALIA

1987 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 378
Author(s):  
B.F. Towler ◽  
B. Bubela

The Alton Field has produced 1.875 million stock tank barrels of oil and is nearing the end of its primary life. It is proposed to enhance the recovery from the field microbiologically. Surfactant producing bacteria will be injected into the reservoir in order to lower the oil/water interfacial tension and mobilise the remaining oil. Laboratory experiments on artifical cores have demonstrated the viability of this process. This MEOR project will initially be done in a one-well cyclic Huff and Puff program.

Author(s):  
Ahmed Ragab ◽  
Eman M. Mansour

The enhanced oil recovery phase of oil reservoirs production usually comes after the water/gas injection (secondary recovery) phase. The main objective of EOR application is to mobilize the remaining oil through enhancing the oil displacement and volumetric sweep efficiency. The oil displacement efficiency enhances by reducing the oil viscosity and/or by reducing the interfacial tension, while the volumetric sweep efficiency improves by developing a favorable mobility ratio between the displacing fluid and the remaining oil. It is important to identify remaining oil and the production mechanisms that are necessary to improve oil recovery prior to implementing an EOR phase. Chemical enhanced oil recovery is one of the major EOR methods that reduces the residual oil saturation by lowering water-oil interfacial tension (surfactant/alkaline) and increases the volumetric sweep efficiency by reducing the water-oil mobility ratio (polymer). In this chapter, the basic mechanisms of different chemical methods have been discussed including the interactions of different chemicals with the reservoir rocks and fluids. In addition, an up-to-date status of chemical flooding at the laboratory scale, pilot projects and field applications have been reported.


2018 ◽  
Vol 124 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Hassan Soleimani ◽  
Mirza Khurram Baig ◽  
Noorhana Yahya ◽  
Leila Khodapanah ◽  
Maziyar Sabet ◽  
...  

Processes ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (9) ◽  
pp. 1073 ◽  
Author(s):  
Goshtasp Cheraghian ◽  
Sara Rostami ◽  
Masoud Afrand

Nanoparticles (NPs) are known as important nanomaterials for a broad range of commercial and research applications owing to their physical characteristics and properties. Currently, the demand for NPs for use in enhanced oil recovery (EOR) is very high. The use of NPs can drastically benefit EOR by changing the wettability of the rock, improving the mobility of the oil drop and decreasing the interfacial tension (IFT) between oil/water. This paper focuses on a review of the application of NPs in the flooding process, the effect of NPs on wettability and the IFT. The study also presents a review of several investigations about the most common NPs, their physical and mechanical properties and benefits in EOR.


Fuel ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 191 ◽  
pp. 239-250 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sivabalan Sakthivel ◽  
Sugirtha Velusamy ◽  
Vishnu Chandrasekharan Nair ◽  
Tushar Sharma ◽  
Jitendra S. Sangwai

2018 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 101-106
Author(s):  
Cut Nanda Sari ◽  
Usman Usman ◽  
Rukman Hertadi ◽  
Tegar Nurwahyu Wijaya ◽  
Leni Herlina ◽  
...  

Peptides and their derivatives can be applied in enhanced oil recovery (EOR) due to their ability to form an emulsion with hydrophobic molecules. However, peptide research for EOR application, either theoretical or computational studies, is still limited. The purpose of this research is to analyse the potency of the X6D model of surfactant peptide for EOR by molecular dynamics simulations in oil-water interface. Molecular dynamics simulation using GROMACS Software with Martini force field can assess a peptides ability for self-assembly and emulsification on a microscopic scale. Molecular dynamics simulations combined with coarse grained models will give information about the dynamics of peptide molecules in oil-water interface and the calculation of interfacial tension value. Four designs of X6D model: F6D, L6D, V6D, and I6D are simulated on the oil-water interface. The value of interfacial tension from simulation show the trend of F6D L6D I6D V6D. The results indicate that V6D has the greatest reduction in interfacial tension and has the stability until 90C with the salinity of at least 1M NaCl.


NANO ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (02) ◽  
pp. 1950020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiaohe Tao ◽  
Sai Guo ◽  
Peisong Liu ◽  
Xiaohong Li ◽  
Zhijun Zhang

Different dosages of hexamethyldisilazane (denoted as HMDS), a silane coupling agent, were adopted to modify nanosilica (denoted as NS) to afford a series of HMDS-NS nanoparticles with different hydrophilic-lipophilic balance governed by the amount of surface hydroxyl. The amounts of the hydrophilic hydroxyl of the as-prepared HMDS-NS nanoparticles and their water contact angles were measured, and their dispersing behavior in water and oil was examined in relation to their transfer behavior therein. Moreover, the effects of the as-prepared HMDS-NS nanofluids on the oil–water interfacial tension as well as the oil recovery were investigated based on interfacial tension measurements and simulated rock core flooding tests. Findings indicate that the hydrophilic-lipophilic balance of HMDS-NS nanoparticles highly depends on the amount of the surface hydroxyl, and the surface hydroxyl amount can be well adjusted by properly selecting the dosage of HMDS modifier. Besides, the transfer behavior of HMDS-NS nanoparticles in oil and water is closely related to their hydrophilic-lipophilic balance, and they can greatly reduce the oil–water interfacial tension and increase the oil recovery by 7.7–11.1% as compared with conventional water flooding. This is because the surface grafting of the hydrophobic segments of HMDS leads to a significant increase in the hydrophobicity of nanosilica, thereby changing the wettability of oil on the sand surface and favoring the stripping of oil droplets. Particularly, the HMDS-NS nanofluid obtained with 2[Formula: see text]wt.% of HMDS modifier has a water contact angle of 83.6∘ and can dramatically reduce the oil–water interfacial tension from 20.22[Formula: see text]mN/m to 0.28[Formula: see text]mN/m, showing desired hydrophilic-lipophilic balance and potential for enhanced oil recovery associated with chemical flooding.


Crystals ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (12) ◽  
pp. 626
Author(s):  
Nurul Afiqah Mohd Mokhtar ◽  
Hoe Guan Beh ◽  
Kean Chuan Lee

Recently, a non-invasive method of injecting magnetic/dielectric nanofluids into the oil reservoir was used for oil recovery application. The use of magnetic nanofluids in Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) has been reported to improve oil recovery. It is believed that the magnetic properties of nanoparticles (NPs) have a direct influence on the viscosity and wettability of nanofluid, and on oil-water interfacial tension (IFT). Thus, Mn0.5Zn0.5Fe2O4 (MnZn) ferrites may be a good candidate to be used in nanofluids for wettability alteration and oil-water IFT reduction due to their excellent magnetic properties, such as a high initial permeability and low magnetic losses. Therefore, this work investigated the potential of MnZn ferrite NPs to alter viscosity, wettability, and oil-water IFT. MnZn Ferrite NPs have been synthesized by a sol-gel auto-combustion process. The effects of calcination temperature varying from 300 °C to 700 °C on the phase formation, microstructures such as surface morphology, and magnetic characterizations were studied. MnZn ferrite nanofluids were prepared using synthesized MnZn NPs that dispersed into brine along with sodium dodecylbenzenesulfonate (SDBS) as a dispersant, and their effects on the wettability and oil-water IFT were studied. X-ray diffraction (XRD) measurements revealed that MnZn ferrite calcined at 300 °C and 400 °C were single phase. The average crystallite size calculated through Scherrer’s equation differed from 32.0 to 87.96 nm. The results showed that the nanofluid with MnZn particles calcined at 300 °C is the best nanofluid in terms of IFT reduction and base nanofluid’s wettability alteration. Moreover, the overall results proved that nanofluid with MnZn ferrite NPs can alter the wettability of base nanofluid, oil-nanofluid IFT, and nanofluid viscosity. This study provides insights towards a better understanding of the potential application of MnZn Ferrite nanofluids to Wettability Alteration and IFT Reduction in Enhanced Oil Recovery.


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