A new approach to evaluate the particle growth and sedimentation of dispersed polymer microsphere profile control system based on multiple light scattering

Abstract

Dispersed polymer microsphere system, which consists of polymer microspheres and polymers, is a novel suspension system for profile control treatment in heterogeneous reservoirs. The stability of the dispersed polymer microsphere system plays a decisive role in the profile control treatment. In this paper, LEM-1 polymer microspheres with initial particle size of 100μm were prepared by inverse suspension polymerization. The stability analyzer based on multiple light scattering was used to research the particle growth and microscopic migration characteristics of polymer microspheres. And the influence factors on the stability of the dispersed polymer microsphere profile control system were also systematically analyzed by Turbiscan Stability Index (TSI) with the help of Turbiscan Easy Soft. The results showed that the stability analyzer provided a fast and accurate method for the study of particle growth rule of gel particles which are similar to polymer microspheres. Moreover, the sedimentation process could be observed from the transmitted light. The TSI value showed that higher concentration polymer could make the system more stable. In the slightly alkaline environment, the higher the temperature is, the more stable the system is. When the concentration of metal ion in the formation water increased, the system became more stable, especially for the divalent metal ions that could stabilize the profile control system better than monovalent metal ions. Finally, a new method for stability evaluation of the profile control system was constructed according to the TSI value. This provided a basis for rapid qualitative and quantitative evaluation of the stability of the dispersed polymer microsphere profile control system.