Effects of temperature and nanofluid type on the oil recovery from a vertical porous media in antigravity fluid injection

Abstract

Recent researches indicate that the injection of nanofluid solutions into oil reservoirs enhances oil recovery, but the impact of key important parameters such as antigravity fluid injection has not yet been well understood. In current experimental investigation, effects of temperature and antigravity injection on the enhancement of oil recovery was studied. Additionally, effects of wettability alteration, interfacial tension, and viscosity were investigated. Pure water, TiO2, CuO, and γ-Al2O3 nanofluids were considered as injected fluid. During the antigravity fluid injection process, decreasing the capillary number enhanced the oil recovery. This increment for pure water, TiO2, CuO, and γ-Al2O3 nanofluids injection was 42.8%, 65.7%, 73.5%, and 75.7%, respectively. Compared to the gravity-aligned injection, these results show enhancement by up to 18.25%, 19.7%, 17.5%, and 23.7%. Moreover, for injection in antigravity direction when water, TiO2, CuO, and γ-Al2O3 nanofluids injected at 90 °C oil recovery enhanced by 7.8%, 5.2%, 3.7%, and 2.75%, respectively, compared to the results obtained for injection at 25 °C. Besides, oil recovery enhanced substantially by interfacial tension reduction when using nanofluids instead of water. For instance, the maximum recovery belongs to γ-Al2O3 nanofluid by 43.5% as the interfacial tension reduced from 45.03 mN/m for oil-water to 2.36 mN/m for oil and γ-Al2O3 nanofluid. Furthermore, increasing the injection temperature from 25 °C to 90 °C reduced the interfacial tension. This reduction for water injection was 15.8%, and 21.2% for γ-Al2O3 nanofluid injection.