Synthesis and evaluation of physicochemical properties of anionic polymeric surfactant derived from Jatropha oil for application in enhanced oil recovery

Abstract

In this study an attention has been paid to synthesize polymer grafted anionic surfactant (PMES) derived from nonedible vegetable oil (Jatropha) for its application in enhanced oil recovery (EOR). The polymeric surfactant was prepared by reacting acrylamide monomer with methyl ester sulfonate (MES) synthesized from Jatropha oil by free radical polymerization mechanism. Polymeric surfactant with properties of both surfactant and polymer can control the mobility ratio and reduce interfacial tension (IFT), which are desirable for EOR. The synthesized polymeric surfactant was characterized through FTIR, 1H NMR, FESEM, EDX, TGA, DLS analysis. The effectiveness of PMES for chemically enhanced oil recovery process was investigated by measurement of physiochemical properties of its aqueous solution viz. reduction of IFT, wettability alteration and rheological behaviour. Rheological studies shows shear thinning behaviour with apparent viscosity comparable to conventional polymers. The IFT between crude oil and aqueous PMES solution at its critical micelle concentration (CMC) was observed as 2.74mN/m, which was further reduced to 0.37mN/m on addition of 2.5wt% NaCl. Core flooding experiments were conducted in sandpack system, to study the EOR efficiency using the synthesized polymeric surfactant and more than 26% additional recovery was observed after usual water flooding. Higher recoveries at higher temperature were observed because of swelling of crude oil and lowering of IFT.