Abstract
Crude oil emulsion is an inevitable phenomenon in hydrocarbon production. Treatment of crude oil emulsion is challenging when the emulsion is stabilized. As crude oil is brought to the surface and pumped to the production facilities, the formation of emulsion increases operating cost. There is a wide array of demulsifiers that are available in the oil and gas industry for the treatment of crude oil emulsion, but one major concern has always been the efficiency of the treatment. No single universal demulsifier can effectively remove emulsion and a combination of two or more is usually expensive. In this study, crude samples were collected from the inlet manifold of a Niger Delta field and bottle tests were conducted with several demulsifiers to select the best chemical demulsifier for use in treating the emulsions as well as the optimum combination. To achieve this objective, twelve different industrial-based demulsifiers were considered which were EXP50, Separol NF-36, Baker-Basf V13-312, Servo CC-8271, Tretolite RP6275, NACCO-Exxon 006-1442, DMO87005, EXP30, AnticorQIT007, AnticorBE027, DMO86634 and DMO81656. It was observed that DMO87005 and AnticorQIT007 produced better results based on separated water volume than other demulsifiers. Hence, the decision to use these demulsifiers to assess their combined potential and the demulsifier factors, namely, concentration, temperature and time effects on the separated water volume using design of experiments (DOE) approach. The results obtained shows that the selected demulsifiers DMO87005 and AnticorQIT007 in a combined form separate more water volume from the crude oil emulsion. Also, the performance of the combined demulsifier is dependent on the combination ratio of the selected demulsifiers. Furthermore, the results depict that the selected (non-combined) demulsifiers and the combined demulsifier factors’ main effects on the separated water volume are concentration, while concentration-time and temperature-time are the factors’ interaction effects for selected and combined demulsifiers, respectively. Again, the magnitude of the main and interaction effects of the combined demulsifier’s factors on the separated water volume is affected by the selected demulsifiers combination ratio. Thus, the combined demulsifier at 0.45mL concentration at a temperature of 90°C for 60 minutes gave a good potential that would necessitate its use for crude oil emulsion treatment in the Niger Delta.
Highlights
The most important objective of any oil production facility is the separation of water from produced crude [1]
The separated water volume obtained with 0.45mL demulsifier concentration at a temperature 90°C were 30.0mL and 33.0mL for AnticorQIT007 and DMO87005, respectively
These results imply that the two demulsifiers were more active than their counterparts to break the stability of the crude oil emulsion
Summary
The most important objective of any oil production facility is the separation of water from produced crude [1]. Oil production is always accompanied by the undesired formation of emulsions due to the presence of naturally occurring surface-active molecules such as asphaltenes and resins [1]. The mixture of oil and water during production activity is known as emulsion. They are defined as a suspension of droplets, greater than 0.1 micron in diameter, consisting of two completely immiscible liquids, one of which is dispersed throughout the other [2]. The presence of emulsifier stabilizes the oil/water interface and it is necessary to break the emulsions by adding other surface-active molecules like fatty acids sulfonates, ethoxylated compounds such as ethoxylated propylene glycol. Crude oil is produced as water in oil emulsion and demulsifiers are necessary to break such emulsions.
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