InterPore2018 New Orleans

Microscale Modeling of the Effect of Silica nanoparticles and Surfactants on Heavy Oil Displacements

14 May 2018, 15:19

15m

New Orleans

Oral 20 Minutes MS 4.25: Transport Processes Controlling Unconventional Reservoir Production Performance Parallel 2-E

Speaker

Dr S. Hossein Hejazi (Subsurface Fluidics and Porous Media Laboratory; Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering; University of Calgary)

Description

Chemicals in the form of nanoparticles or surfactants provide opportunities to improve oil displacement from rocks. They increase the rate of hydrocarbon recovery by breaking down the oil trapped in by-passed zones and separating the residual oil from rock surfaces in the form of tiny droplets suspended in the water phase. In this study, a series of heavy oil displacement experiments are conducted by flowing a series of aqueous solutions through an oil-wet and transparent network of microfluidic devices. Micromodels are fabricated by soft lithography techniques on a silicon wafer and replicated with Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) polymer. The effect of silica nanoparticles and three different types of surfactants (SDS, Tween 20, and Silwet) on the displacement of heavy oil, removal of oil films, and mobilization of trapped oil droplets are investigated. Furthermore, the patterns of residual oil and final oil recovery factors are explored. Also, the synergism effect between nanoparticles and different types of surfactants are reported.
3D Confocal microscopy coupled with fast speed fluorescent imaging of the displacement process reveals the effect of each chemical additive on oil mobilization. Silica particles show the tendency to reduce or remove the remaining oil film thickness while the surfactants break up the oil phase in the by-passed channels into tiny clusters that can be transported by the displacing fluid. The results demonstrate that the addition of the silica nanoparticles increases the rate of oil recovery up to 60% resulted from the wettability alteration and oil film removal. Moreover, the recovery factors increase upon adding the silica nanoparticles to a constant concentration of Tween 20 and SDS. The silicon-based surfactants improve the oil recovery up to 80 % where the recovery improvement by the addition of nanoparticles is negligible.
The developed microfluidic-based model is a powerful mimetic prototype of real porous media which can clarify the mechanisms underlying the process of chemical-based flooding for oil recovery. Considering the time-consuming and expensive nature of core-flood experiments, the proposed microfluidic approach provides an attractive alternative for rapid and low-cost enhanced oil recovery (EOR) screening studies.