Recent Studies of the Recovery of Oil from Sands

Abstract

The Petroleum Experiment Station of the U. S. Bureau of Mines atBartlesville, Okla., has for the past three and a half years maintained alaboratory with the necessary personnel for conducting research on methods ofincreasing the recovery of oil. Some of the preliminary problems encountered instarting this work, with the data obtained, were discussed in A. 1. M. E.Technical Publication No. 144, "Oil Recovery Investigations of thePetroleum Experiment Station of the U. S. Bureau of Mines," which waspresented at the October meeting of the Institute at Tulsa, Okla., in1928. Scope of Paper The following discussion gives some of the results of the more recent work atthe Oil Recovery Laboratory. These experiments were conducted to obtainlaboratory data pertaining to the relative merits or efficiencies of variouspressure media in the recovery of oil from a sand reservoir. Two general typesof experiments were conducted. In one the various pressure media were passedthrough an artificial body of sand partly saturated with oil at a constantinput pressure; in the other the pressure media were passed through the body ofsand partly saturated with oil at a constant volume rate. No attempt will bemade to discuss the ramifications of economic problems which enter into thechoice of a pressure medium. Apparatus and Materials The two 6-in. by 6-ft. flow tubes described in Technical Publication 144 wereused in these experiments. They consist of 6-ft. sections of 6-in. casing witha blind flange at each end.