Experimental investigation on new derived natural surfactant: wettability alteration, IFT reduction, and core flooding in oil wet carbonate reservoir

Author(s):  
Ali Jalali ◽  
Ali Mohsenatabar Firozjaii ◽  
Seyed Reza Shadizadeh
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yongsheng Tan ◽  
Qi Li ◽  
Liang Xu ◽  
Xiaoyan Zhang ◽  
Tao Yu

<p>The wettability, fingering effect and strong heterogeneity of carbonate reservoirs lead to low oil recovery. However, carbon dioxide (CO<sub>2</sub>) displacement is an effective method to improve oil recovery for carbonate reservoirs. Saturated CO<sub>2</sub> nanofluids combines the advantages of CO<sub>2</sub> and nanofluids, which can change the reservoir wettability and improve the sweep area to achieve the purpose of enhanced oil recovery (EOR), so it is a promising technique in petroleum industry. In this study, comparative experiments of CO<sub>2</sub> flooding and saturated CO<sub>2</sub> nanofluids flooding were carried out in carbonate reservoir cores. The nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) instrument was used to clarify oil distribution during core flooding processes. For the CO<sub>2</sub> displacement experiment, the results show that viscous fingering and channeling are obvious during CO<sub>2</sub> flooding, the oil is mainly produced from the big pores, and the residual oil is trapped in the small pores. For the saturated CO<sub>2</sub> nanofluids displacement experiment, the results show that saturated CO<sub>2</sub> nanofluids inhibit CO<sub>2</sub> channeling and fingering, the oil is produced from the big pores and small pores, the residual oil is still trapped in the small pores, but the NMR signal intensity of the residual oil is significantly reduced. The final oil recovery of saturated CO<sub>2</sub> nanofluids displacement is higher than that of CO<sub>2</sub> displacement. This study provides a significant reference for EOR in carbonate reservoirs. Meanwhile, it promotes the application of nanofluids in energy exploitation and CO<sub>2</sub> utilization.</p>


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabor Hursan ◽  
Mohammed Sahhaf ◽  
Wala’a Amairi

Abstract The objective of this work is to optimize the placement of horizontal power water injector (PWI) wells in stratified heterogeneous carbonate reservoir with tar barriers. The key to successful reservoir navigation is a reliable real-time petrophysical analysis that resolves rock quality variations and differentiates tar barriers from lighter hydrocarbon intervals. An integrated workflow has been generated based on logging-while drilling (LWD) triple combo and Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) logging data for fluid identification, tar characterization and permeability prediction. The workflow has three steps; it starts with the determination of total porosity using density and neutron logs, the calculation of water-filled porosity from resistivity measurements and an additional partitioning of porosity into bound and free fluid volumes using the NMR data. Second, the total and water-filled porosity, the NMR bound fluid and NMR total porosity are used as inputs in a hydrocarbon compositional and viscosity analysis of hydrocarbon-bearing zones for the recognition of tar-bearing and lighter hydrocarbon intervals. Third, in the lighter hydrocarbon intervals, NMR logs are further analyzed using a multi-cutoff spectral analysis to identify microporous and macroporous zones and to calculate the NMR mobility index. The ideal geosteering targets are highly macroporous rocks containing no heavy hydrocarbons. In horizontal wells, the method is validated using formation pressure while drilling (FPWD) measurements. The procedure has been utilized in several wells. The original well path of the first injector was planned to maintain a safe distance above an anticipated tar-bearing zone. Utilizing the new real-time viscosity evaluation, the well was steered closer to the tar zone several feet below the original plan, setting an improved well placement protocol for subsequent injectors. In the water- or lighter hydrocarbon-bearing zones, spectral analysis of NMR logs clearly accentuated micro- and macroporous carbonate intervals. The correlation between pore size and rock quality has been corroborated by FPWD mobility measurements. In one well, an extremely slow NMR relaxation may indicate wettability alteration in a macroporous interval. An integrated real-time evaluation of porosity, fluid saturation, hydrocarbon viscosity and pore size has enhanced well placement in a heterogeneous carbonate formation where tar barriers are also present. The approach increased well performance and substantially improved reservoir understanding.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xurong Zhao ◽  
Tianbo Liang ◽  
Jingge Zan ◽  
Mengchuan Zhang ◽  
Fujian Zhou ◽  
...  

Abstract Replacing oil from small pores of tight oil-wet rocks relies on altering the rock wettability with the injected fracturing fluid. Among different types of wettability-alteration surfactants, the liquid nanofluid has less adsorption loss during transport in the porous media, and can efficiently alter the rock wettability; meanwhile, it can also maintain a certain oil-water interfacial tension driving the water imbibition. In the previous study, the main properties of a Nonionic nanofluid-diluted microemulsion (DME) were evaluated, and the dispersion coefficient and adsorption rate of DME in tight rock under different conditions were quantified. In this study, to more intuitively show the change of wettability of DME to oil-wet rocks in the process of core flooding experiments and the changes of the water invasion front, CT is used to carry out on-line core flooding experiments, scan and calculate the water saturation in time, and compare it with the pressure drop in this process. Besides, the heterogeneity of rock samples is quantified in this paper. The results show that when the DME is used as the fracturing fluid additive, fingering of the water phase is observed at the beginning of the invasion; compared with brine, the fracturing fluid with DME has deeper invasion depth at the same time; the water invasion front gradually becomes uniform when the DME alters the rock wettability and triggers the imbibition; for tight rocks, DME can enter deeper pores and replace more oil because of its dominance. Finally, the selected nanofluids of DME were tested in two horizontal wells in the field, and their flowback fluids were collected and analyzed. The results show that the average droplet size of the flowback fluids in the wells using DME decreases with production time, and the altered wetting ability gradually returns to the level of the injected fracturing fluid. It can be confirmed that DME can migrate within the tight rock, make the rock surface more water-wet and enhance the imbibition capacity of the fracturing fluid, to reduce the reservoir pressure decline rate and increase production.


2019 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 393-408 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bisweswar Ghosh ◽  
Liying Sun ◽  
Nithin Chacko Thomas

Abstract Waterflood-assisted oil recovery with sulfate-spiked seawater would cause incompatibility scaling in carbonate reservoirs and reduce economic benefits. This research investigated the benefits of polyphosphate compounds in reducing scaling potential as well as its effect on oil recovery when mixed in high sulfate flood water. Severity of scaling potential of sulfate-spiked water in a carbonate reservoir environment was measured, followed by systematic screening of a polyphosphate compound, which successfully inhibited the sulfate scale precipitation at concentration as low as 100 ppm. The new formulation (seawater with four times sulfate and phosphate, SW4SP) was evaluated and compared with benchmark formulation (modified seawater with four times sulfate, SW4S). Contact angle, ζ-potential and drainage studies show that SW4SP changed the rock wettability from oil wet to water wet to a larger degree compared to SW4S. Improved recovery efficiency of SW4SP was confirmed through a set of core flooding studies in the tertiary and quaternary flood modes. Whereas SW4S recovered 7.7% of original oil in place (OOIP), SW4SP recovered about 8% of OOIP in the tertiary mode under approximately identical flow conditions. Flooding with SW4SP in the quaternary mode following a tertiary flood with SW4S on the same core resulted in 1.7% additional oil recovery, showing improved efficiency of the new flood water formulation.


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