scholarly journals Investigation of an Improved Polymer Flooding Scheme by Compositionally-Tuned Slugs

Processes ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 197 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ryan Santoso ◽  
Victor Torrealba ◽  
Hussein Hoteit
Keyword(s):  
Oil Recovery ◽  
Polymer Flooding ◽  
Solution Viscosity ◽  
Design Parameters ◽  
High Concentration ◽  
Sweep Efficiency ◽  
Polymer Injection ◽  
Low Salinity ◽  
Injection Scheme ◽  
Vertical Heterogeneity

Polymer flooding is an effective enhanced oil recovery technology used to reduce the mobility ratio and improve sweep efficiency. A new polymer injection scheme is investigated that relies on the cyclical injection of low-salinity, low-concentration polymer slugs chased by high-salinity, high-concentration polymer slugs. The effectiveness of the process is a function of several reservoir and design parameters related to polymer type, concentration, salinity, and reservoir heterogeneity. We use reservoir simulations and design-of-experiments (DoE) to investigate the effectiveness of the proposed polymer injection scheme. We show how key objective functions, such as recovery factor and injectivity, are impacted by the reservoir and design parameters. In this study, simulations showed that the new slug-based process was always superior to the reference polymer injection scheme using the traditional continuous injection scheme. Our results show that the process is most effective when the polymer weight is high, corresponding to large inaccessible pore-volumes, which enhances polymer acceleration. High vertical heterogeneity typically reduces the process performance because of increased mixing in the reservoir. The significance of this process is that it allows for increased polymer solution viscosity in the reservoir without increasing the total mass of polymer, and without impairing polymer injectivity at the well.

An Easy Calculation Method on Sweep Efficiency of Chemical Flooding

2013 ◽  
Vol 275-277 ◽  
pp. 496-501
Author(s):  
Fu Qing Yuan ◽  
Zhen Quan Li
Keyword(s):  
Oil Recovery ◽  
Orthogonal Design ◽  
Polymer Flooding ◽  
Water Flooding ◽  
Solution Viscosity ◽  
Chemical Flooding ◽  
Oil Viscosity ◽  
Sweep Efficiency ◽  
Easy Calculation ◽  
Polymer Compound

According to the geological parameters of Shengli Oilfield, sweep efficiency of chemical flooding was analyzed according to injection volume, injection-production parameters of polymer flooding or surfactant-polymer compound flooding. The orthogonal design method was employed to select the important factors influencing on expanding sweep efficiency by chemical flooding. Numerical simulation method was utilized to analyze oil recovery and sweep efficiency of different flooding methods, such as water flooding, polymer flooding and surfactant-polymer compound flooding. Finally, two easy calculation models were established to calculate the expanding degree of sweep efficiency by polymer flooding or SP compound flooding than water flooding. The models were presented as the relationships between geological parameters, such as effective thickness, oil viscosity, porosity and permeability, and fluid parameters, such as polymer-solution viscosity and oil-water interfacial tension. The precision of the two models was high enough to predict sweep efficiency of polymer flooding or SP compound flooding.

Enhancing Heavy-Oil-Recovery Efficiency by Combining Low-Salinity-Water and Polymer Flooding

SPE Journal ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Yang Zhao ◽  
Shize Yin ◽  
Randall S. Seright ◽  
Samson Ning ◽  
Yin Zhang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Oil Recovery ◽  
Heavy Oil ◽  
High Salinity ◽  
Polymer Flooding ◽  
Heavy Oil Recovery ◽  
Sweep Efficiency ◽  
Low Salinity ◽  
Low Salinity Water ◽  
Salinity Water ◽  
Increased Oil Recovery

Summary Combining low-salinity-water (LSW) and polymer flooding was proposed to unlock the tremendous heavy-oil resources on the Alaska North Slope (ANS). The synergy of LSW and polymer flooding was demonstrated through coreflooding experiments at various conditions. The results indicate that the high-salinity polymer (HSP) (salinity = 27,500 ppm) requires nearly two-thirds more polymer than the low-salinity polymer (LSP) (salinity = 2,500 ppm) to achieve the target viscosity at the condition of this study. Additional oil was recovered from LSW flooding after extensive high-salinity-water (HSW) flooding [3 to 9% of original oil in place (OOIP)]. LSW flooding performed in secondary mode achieved higher recovery than that in tertiary mode. Also, the occurrence of water breakthrough can be delayed in the LSW flooding compared with the HSW flooding. Strikingly, after extensive LSW flooding and HSP flooding, incremental oil recovery (approximately 8% of OOIP) was still achieved by LSP flooding with the same viscosity as the HSP. The pH increase of the effluent during LSW/LSP flooding was significantly greater than that during HSW/HSP flooding, indicating the presence of the low-salinity effect (LSE). The residual-oil-saturation (Sor) reduction induced by the LSE in the area unswept during the LSW flooding (mainly smaller pores) would contribute to the increased oil recovery. LSP flooding performed directly after waterflooding recovered more incremental oil (approximately 10% of OOIP) compared with HSP flooding performed in the same scheme. Apart from the improved sweep efficiency by polymer, the low-salinity-induced Sor reduction also would contribute to the increased oil recovery by the LSP. A nearly 2-year pilot test in the Milne Point Field on the ANS has shown impressive success of the proposed hybrid enhanced-oil-recovery (EOR) process: water-cut reduction (70 to less than 15%), increasing oil rate, and no polymer breakthrough so far. This work has demonstrated the remarkable economical and technical benefits of combining LSW and polymer flooding in enhancing heavy-oil recovery.

Laboratory Investigations of Factors Influencing Polymer Flood Performance

1975 ◽  
Vol 15 (04) ◽  
pp. 338-346 ◽  
Author(s):  
M.T. Szabo
Keyword(s):  
Oil Recovery ◽  
Polymer Solutions ◽  
Polymer Concentration ◽  
Polymer Flooding ◽  
Mobility Control ◽  
Sweep Efficiency ◽  
Experimental Conditions ◽  
Polymer Injection ◽  
Polymer Flood

Abstract Numerous polymer floods were performed in unconsolidated sand packs using a C14-tagged, cross-linked, partially hydrolyzed ployacrylamide, and the data are compared with brine-flood performance in the same sands. performance in the same sands. The amount of "polymer oil" was linearly proportional to polymer concentration up to a proportional to polymer concentration up to a limiting value. The upper limit of polymer concentration yielding additional polymer oil was considerably higher for a high-permeability sand than for a low-permeability sand. It is shown that a minimum polymer concentration exists, below which no appreciable polymer oil can be produced in high-permeability sands. The effect of polymer slug size on oil recovery is shown for various polymer concentrations, and the results from these tests are used to determine the optimum slug size and polymer concentration for different sands. The effect of salinity was studied by using brine and tap water during polymer floods under similar conditions. Decreased salinity resulted in improved oil recovery at low, polymer concentrations, but it had little effect at higher polymer concentrations. Polymer injection that was started at an advanced stage of brine flood also improved the oil recovery in single-layered sand packs. Experimental data are presented showing the effect of polymer concentration and salinity on polymer-flood performance in stratified reservoir polymer-flood performance in stratified reservoir models. Polymer concentrations in the produced water were measured by analyzing the radioactivity of effluent samples, and the amounts of retained polymer in the stratified models are given for each polymer in the stratified models are given for each experiment. Introduction In the early 1960's, a new technique using dilute polymer solutions to increase oil recovery was polymer solutions to increase oil recovery was introduced in secondary oil-recovery operations. Since then, this new technique has attained wide-spread commercial application. The success and the complexity of this new technology has induced many authors to investigate many aspects of this flooding technique. Laboratory and field studies, along with numerical simulation of polymer flooding, clearly demonstrated that polymer additives increase oil recovery. polymer additives increase oil recovery. Some of the laboratory results have shown that applying polymers in waterflooding reduces the residual oil saturation through an improvement in microscopic sweep efficiency. Other laboratory studies have shown that applying polymer solutions improves the sweep efficiency in polymer solutions improves the sweep efficiency in heterogeneous systems. Numerical simulation of polymer flooding, and a summary of 56 field applications, clearly showed that polymer injection initiated at an early stage of waterflooding is more efficient than when initiated at an advanced stage. Although much useful information has been presented, the experimental conditions were so presented, the experimental conditions were so variable that difficulties arose in correlating the numerical data. So, despite this good data, a systematic laboratory study of the factors influencing the performance of polymer flooding was still lacking in the literature. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of polymer concentration, polymer slug size, salinity in the polymer bank, initial water saturation, and permeability on the performance of polymer floods. The role of oil viscosity did not constitute a subject of this investigation. However, some of the data indicated that the applied polymer resulted in added recovery when displacing more viscous oil. The linear polymer-flood tests were coupled with tests in stratified systems, consisting of the same sand materials used in linear flood tests. Thus, it was possible to differentiate between the role of polymer in mobility control behind the flood front in each layer and its role in mobility control in the entire stratified system through improvement in vertical sweep efficiency. A radioactive, C14-tagged hydrolyzed polyacrylamide was used in all oil-recovery tests. polyacrylamide was used in all oil-recovery tests. SPEJ P. 338

scholarly journals Evaluation of Polymer Alternating Waterflooding in Multilayered Heterogeneous Waterflooded Reservoir

2018 ◽  
Vol 171 ◽  
pp. 04001
Author(s):  
Warut Tuncharoen ◽  
Falan Srisuriyachai
Keyword(s):  
Numerical Simulation ◽  
Viscous Fluid ◽  
Polymer Solution ◽  
Oil Recovery ◽  
High Viscosity ◽  
Polymer Flooding ◽  
Operating Parameters ◽  
Sweep Efficiency ◽  
Polymer Injection ◽  
Water Breakthrough

Polymer flooding is widely implemented to improve oil recovery since polymer can increase sweep efficiency and smoothen heterogeneous reservoir profile. However, polymer solution is somewhat difficult to be injected due to high viscosity and thus, water slug is recommended to be injected before and during polymer injection in order to increase an ease of injecting this viscous fluid into the wellbore. In this study, numerical simulation is performed to determine the most appropriate operating parameters to maximize oil recovery. The results show that pre-flushed water should be injected until water breakthrough while alternating water slug size should be as low as 5% of polymer slug size. Concentration for each polymer slugs should be kept constant and recommended number of alternative cycles is 2. Combining these operating parameters altogether contributes to oil recovery of 53.69% whereas single-slug polymer flooding provides only 53.04% which is equivalent to 8,000 STB of oil gain.

scholarly journals Adaptive study on polymer flooding of secondary reservoir and infilling uniform

2018 ◽  
Vol 175 ◽  
pp. 01006
Author(s):  
Xu WenBo
Keyword(s):  
Oil Recovery ◽  
Physical Simulation ◽  
Injection Pressure ◽  
Leading Edge ◽  
Polymer Flooding ◽  
Water Flooding ◽  
Monitoring Methods ◽  
Sweep Efficiency ◽  
Plane Sweep ◽  
Polymer Injection

For the main polymer flooding oilfield expansion and infill wells three times the area of deployment, the proposed development mode II oil reservoir of polymer flooding and thin and poor combination of three encryption. In this paper, the use of leading edge water monitoring methods and principles of the plane heterogeneity through physical simulation to study the effects of different mining methods II oil and a combination of the three encryption effects of flooding. Studies have shown that, together with the water flooding recovery can be increased by nearly 19 percent, higher than the water poly alternate drive about 4%, the injection pressure is about three types of reservoir 0.3MPa, flat stage water flood sweep efficiency compared with an average of 30.95%. Meanwhile polymer injection can increase oil recovery by 21%, but the limited ability of three types of oil injection, polymer injection pressure during injection 0.22PV up to 0.8MPa, water flooding stage by an average of 30 percent compared to the plane sweep efficiency. The water flooding recovery poly alternately raise only 15%, an average increase of 26.95 percent driven phase plane sweep efficiency than water. Theoretical results of this study may provide a reliable basis for the future development of efficient thin and poor reservoirs.

How Viscoelastic-Polymer Flooding Enhances Displacement Efficiency

SPE Journal ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 21 (03) ◽  
pp. 0675-0687 ◽  
Author(s):  
A.. Clarke ◽  
A. M. Howe ◽  
J.. Mitchell ◽  
J.. Staniland ◽  
L. A. Hawkes
Keyword(s):  
Oil Recovery ◽  
Capillary Number ◽  
Polymer Solutions ◽  
Underlying Mechanism ◽  
Polymer Flooding ◽  
Solution Viscosity ◽  
Flow Profile ◽  
Displacement Efficiency ◽  
Sweep Efficiency ◽  
Viscoelastic Polymer

Summary Increasing flooding-solution viscosity with polymers provides a favorable mobility ratio compared with brine flooding and hence improves volumetric sweep efficiency. Flooding with a polymer solution exhibiting elastic properties has been reported to increase displacement efficiency, resulting in a sustained doubling of the recovery enhancement compared with the use of conventional viscous-polymer flooding (Wang et al. 2011). Flooding with viscoelastic-polymer solutions is claimed also to increase recovery more than expected from changes in capillary number alone (Wang et al. 2010). This increase in displacement efficiency by viscoelastic polymers is reported to occur because of changes in the steady-state-flow profile and enhancements in oil stripping and thread formation. However, within the industry there are doubts that a genuine effect is observed, or that improvements in displacement efficiency occur with field-applicable flow regimes (Vermolen et al. 2014). In this study, we demonstrate that flooding with viscoelastic-polymer solutions can indeed increase recovery more than expected from changes in capillary number. We show a mechanism of fluctuations in flow at low Reynolds number by which viscoelastic-polymer solutions provide improvements in displacement efficiency. The mechanism, known as elastic turbulence, is an effect previously unrecognized in this context. We demonstrate that the effect may be obtained at field-relevant flow rates. Furthermore, this underlying mechanism explains both the enhanced capillary-desaturation curves and the observation of apparent flow thickening (Delshad et al. 2008; Seright et al. 2011) for these viscoelastic solutions in porous media. The work contrasts experiments on flow and recovery by use of viscous and viscoelastic-polymer solutions. The circumstances under which viscoelasticity is beneficial are demonstrated. The findings are applicable to the design of formulations for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) by polymer flooding. A combination of coreflooding, micromodel flow, and rheometric studies is presented. The results include single-phase and multiphase floods in sandstone cores. Polymer solutions are viscoelastic [partially hydrolyzed polyacrylamide (HPAM)] or viscous (xanthan). The effects of molecular weight, flow rate, and concentration of the HPAMs are described. The data lead us to suggest a mechanism that may be used to explain the observations of improved displacement efficiency and why the improvement is not seen for all viscoelastic-polymer floods.

scholarly journals A New Approach to Polymer Flooding: Effects of Early Polymer Injection and Wettability on Final Oil Recovery

SPE Journal ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 24 (01) ◽  
pp. 129-139 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. L. Juárez-Morejón ◽  
H.. Bertin ◽  
A.. Omari ◽  
G.. Hamon ◽  
C.. Cottin ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Oil Recovery ◽  
Phase Distribution ◽  
Water Saturation ◽  
Dominant Role ◽  
Polymer Flooding ◽  
Displacement Efficiency ◽  
Sweep Efficiency ◽  
Two Phase ◽  
Polymer Injection ◽  
The Core

Summary An experimental study of polymer flooding is presented here, focusing on the influence of initial core wettability and flood maturity (volume of water injected before polymer injection) on final oil recovery. Experiments were performed using homogeneous Bentheimer Sandstone samples of similar properties. The cores were oilflooded using mineral oil for water-wet conditions and crude oil (after an aging period) for intermediate-wet conditions; the viscosity ratio between oil and polymer was kept constant in all experiments. Polymer, which is a partially hydrolyzed polyacrylamide (HPAM), was used at a concentration of 2,500 ppm in a moderate-salinity brine. The polymer solution was injected in the core at different waterflood-maturity times [breakthrough (BT) and 0, 1, 1.75, 2.5, 4, and 6.5 pore volumes (PV)]. Coreflood results show that the maturity of polymer injection plays an important role in final oil recovery, regardless of wettability. The waterflood-maturity time 0 PV (polymer injection without initial waterflooding) leads to the best sweep efficiency, whereas final oil production decreases when the polymer-flood maturity is high (late polymer injection after waterflooding). A difference of 15% in recovery is observed between early polymer flooding (0 PV) and late maturity (6.5 PV). Concerning the effect of wettability, the recovery factor obtained with water-wet cores is always lower (from 10 to 20%, depending on maturity) than the values obtained with intermediate-wet cores, raising the importance of correctly restoring core wettability to obtain representative values of polymer incremental recovery. The influence of wettability can be explained by the oil-phase distribution at the pore scale. Considering that the waterflooding period leads to different values of the oil saturation at which polymer flooding starts, we measured the core dispersivity using a tracer method at different states. The two-phase dispersivity decreases when water saturation increases, which is favorable for polymer sweep. This study shows that in addition to wettability, the maturity of polymer flooding plays a dominant role in oil-displacement efficiency. Final recovery is correlated to the dispersion value at which polymer flooding starts. The highest oil recovery is obtained when the polymer is injected early.

Oil recovery by low-salinity polymer flooding in carbonate oil reservoirs

2019 ◽  
Vol 181 ◽  
pp. 106211 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yeonkyeong Lee ◽  
Wonsuk Lee ◽  
Youngho Jang ◽  
Wonmo Sung
Keyword(s):  
Oil Recovery ◽  
Polymer Flooding ◽  
Oil Reservoirs ◽  
Low Salinity

Visco-Elastic Property Studies on Polymer Flooding Systems with High Concentrations

2012 ◽  
Vol 550-553 ◽  
pp. 834-837
Author(s):  
Ji Gang Wang ◽  
Quan Qing Du ◽  
Peng Wu ◽  
Shao Li Hu ◽  
Pan Niu
Keyword(s):  
Elastic Property ◽  
Oil Recovery ◽  
Elastic Characteristic ◽  
Polymer Flooding ◽  
Oil Field ◽  
High Concentration ◽  
Improved Oil Recovery ◽  
High Molecular Weight Polymer ◽  
Molecular Weight Polymer ◽  
Asp Flooding

Keywords: Visco-elastic property; polymer flooding; oil recovery Abstract. Polymer flooding and ASP flooding has improved oil recovery a lot in Daqing oil field. In ASP flooding, the existence of alkali decreases the visco-elastic characteristic of polymer, which decreases the oil recovery of polymer flooding. The aim of this paper was to study the visco-elastic characteristic, shear resistance in high concentration and high molecular weight polymer flooding, and analyzed the suitable parameter of it .They can provide the theory of polymer flooding development and application research.

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