Novel Mechanism Investigation during Development of Nanofluids to Improve Oil Recovery in Malaysian Oilfield

Abstract

Abstract The nanoparticles are considered as an attractive emerging improved oil recovery technique in last decade due to its ability to propagate deeper into pore throat and displace unswept oil in the reservoir. Current understanding of its mechanisms in conventional oil has been observed so called disjoining pressure that involved wettability alteration, log-jamming, and viscosity effect. This paper presents recent investigation of new potential mechanism during development of nanofluids to improve oil recovery in Malaysian oilfield. The new inhouse nanofluids was developed using acrylamide monomers that were grafted on the surface of silica-based nanoparticles. A minor concentration of surfactant was introduced into the formulation to observe synergistic effect. The nanoparticles were characterized under electron microscope. Compatibility and thermal stability tests were conducted using reservoir fluids at reservoir temperature. The rheology of fluids was measured during monitoring of stability. In term of wettability alteration, sequence fluid-fluid and rock-fluid tests were conducted includes dynamic interfacial tension (IFT) and optical contact angle (OCA) measurement. The particle size was measured with size around 20 nm. Adding small concentration of additive showed good performance in term of compatibility, thermal stability, and wettability alteration through IFT reduction and OCA measurement. Nanofluids with additive provided excellent compatibility with reservoir fluids and stable at reservoir temperature over 60 days. Its viscosity was also more stable during observation period without creating micro-emulsion. The IFT reduced insignificantly from 2.6 to 1 mN/m and when introduced additive, the IFT reduction achieved 0.01 mN/m. This synergistic effect was observed during IFT measurement and called as fragmentation. Our recent finding leads to provide new reference for displacement mechanism using next generation of nanofluids and offers further potential of nanoparticles with multiple mechanisms and rapid synergistic effects prior its application in in Malaysian oilfield.