Abstract
Carbon dioxide (CO2) flooding is one of the most globally used EOR processes to enhance oil recovery. However, the low gas viscosity and density result in gas channeling and gravity override which lead to poor sweep efficiency. Foam application for mobility control is a promising technology to increase the gas viscosity, lower the mobility and improve the sweep efficiency in the reservoir. Foam is generated in the reservoir by co-injection of surfactant solutions and gas. Although there are many surfactants that can be used for such purpose, their performance with supercritical CO2 (ScCO2) is weak causing poor or loss of mobility control. This experimental study evaluates a newly developed surfactant (CNF) that was introduced for ScCO2 mobility control in comparison with a common foaming agent, anionic alpha olefin sulfonate (AOS) surfactant. Experimental work was divided into three stages: foam static tests, interfacial tension measurements, and foam dynamic tests. Both surfactants were investigated at different conditions. In general, results show that both surfactants are good foaming agents to reduce the mobility of ScCO2 with better performance of CNF surfactant. Shaking tests in the presence of crude oil show that the foam life for CNF extends to more than 24 h but less than that for AOS. Moreover, CNF features lower critical micelle concentration (CMC), higher adsorption, and smaller area/molecule at the liquid–air interface. Furthermore, entering, spreading, and bridging coefficients indicate that CNF surfactant produces very stable foam with light crude oil in both deionized and saline water, whereas AOS was stable only in deionized water. At all conditions for mobility reduction evaluation, CNF exhibits stronger flow resistance, higher foam viscosity, and higher mobility reduction factor than that of AOS surfactant. In addition, CNF and ScCO2 simultaneous injection produced 8.83% higher oil recovery than that of the baseline experiment and 7.87% higher than that of AOS. Pressure drop profiles for foam flooding using CNF was slightly higher than that of AOS indicating that CNF is better in terms of foam–oil tolerance which resulted in higher oil recovery.
Highlights
It is estimated that two-thirds of the original oil in place (OOIP) are left underground after the primary and secondary oil recovery processes (Green and Willhite 1998)
Gas injection processes face many challenges such as gas channeling and gravity override that lead to poor sweep efficiency (Healy et al 1994)
The dynamic foam tests were divided into three sections: mobility reduction evaluation in the high-permeability glass-bead pack, mobility reduction evaluation in lowpermeability Bentheimer sandstone cores, and core flooding experiments
Summary
It is estimated that two-thirds of the original oil in place (OOIP) are left underground after the primary and secondary oil recovery processes (Green and Willhite 1998). Many enhanced oil recovery (EOR) methods can be used to extract more oil from reservoirs. Among these EOR methods, CO2 injection is one the most used processes globally (Taber et al 1997). Gas injection processes face many challenges such as gas channeling and gravity override that lead to poor sweep efficiency (Healy et al 1994). Many techniques have been applied to enhance the sweep efficiency such as water alternating gas (WAG), polymer, and foam. Foam is a promising technology that can be used to reduce the mobility of the injected gas by Petroleum Science (2020) 17:1025–1036 increasing its viscosity (Enick et al 2012) and diverting the flow toward lower permeability zones where the remaining oil exists (Fried 1961)
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