An Experimental Investigation of Surfactant Flooding Efficiency in Low Viscosity Oil Using a Glass Micromodel

Abstract

A surfactant flooding technique is developed to reduce the amount of residual oil saturation by reducing interfacial tension between multiple phases. Using surfactant flooding in the case of high viscosity oil has been successful, whereas there has not been a complete study of efficiency of this method when dealing with low viscosity oil. In the present study, to investigate the behavior of surfactant flooding in low viscosity oil, the transparent material (glass) was used to construct a micromodel and to study various features of micro-displacement. By implementing a micromodel, the displacement of the fluid and menisci was observed and investigated with the aid of high resolution images. In this work, three types of quarter five-spot glass micromodel patterns were designed and developed, and considered as porous medium. These patterns were saturated with a light and low viscosity oil sample from an Iranian fractured reservoir, and then flooded by surfactant slug in low pressure and low temperature conditions. Two surfactant types, PNX-2360™ and linear alkylbenzene sulphonate, were utilized to inspect the effects of surfactant type, surfactant concentration, co-surfactant concentration, and pore structure in the presence of connate water, and their results were compared to water flooding. Moreover, high resolution images were captured, which illustrate the interaction between surfactant and connate water in micro-scale. The results of experiments illustrated that linear alkylbenzene sulphonate results in higher recovery. It was also found that recovery rises by increasing surfactant concentration. Testing different concentrations of co-surfactants demonstrated that, however, lower concentration of co-surfactants leads to higher recovery, but this increase in recovery is economically considerable. In addition, compared with water flooding, surfactant flooding resulted in a considerable growth in ultimate oil recovery.