concentration

Reservoirs which produce under active water drive offer a significant uncertainty towards implementation of Chemical EOR processes. This paper describes a successful pilot testing of ASP process in a clastic reservoir which is operating under strong aquifer drive. The field has ~ 30 years of production history. The objective of the pilot was to understand response of ASP process in a mature reservoir, which is operating under active edge water drive. The build-up permeability of the reservoir is 2-8 Darcy with viscosity~ 50 cP. Salient key observations like production performance, incremental oil gain, polymer breakthrough etc. are discussed in this paper after completion of the pilot.

On the basis of laboratory study and simulation, ASP pilot was implemented in the field in 2010.The pilot was designed with single inverted five spot pattern and one observation well. The pilot envisaged injection of 0.3 pore volume (PV) Alkali-Surfactant-Polymer (ASP) slug, 0.3 PV graded polymer buffer followed by 0.4PV chase water. The pilot was meticulously monitored for production performance and breakthrough of chemicals. All the pilot producers have more than 20 years of production history. Base oil rate and water cut were fixed before start of the pilot, on the basis of test data which was used to monitor pilot performance. Interwell Tracer Test (IWTT) was conducted before starting of ASP injection so as to understand sweep in the pilot area. In addition, quality of injection water and chemical concentration in ASP slug was checked regularly to ensure best quality.

Significant response of the pilot was observed within 15 months of the start of the pilot which was published in 2012. This paper aims to describe the learning and conclusion after successful completion of the pilot. ~40-50% jump in oil rate was observed during the ASP injection period which sustained for 12-18 months. However preferential breakthrough of ASP slug in one of the producer impacted the incremental oil gain. The preferential breakthrough of polymer was due to presence of high permeability streaks which was rectified by profile modification job. In addition, strong aquifer movement was experienced during ASP injection which leads to rise in water cut of a pilot well. However, the pilot well was restored through water shutoff jobs. After completion of ASP and mobility buffer, a cumulative incremental oil ~28000 m³ was obtained. Cumulative incremental oil gain is in line with simulation studies prediction. 12-14% decrease in water cut was observed which sustained for ~ 6-18 months. Regular monitoring of produced fluid indicated breakthrough of polymer and alkali in 2-3 producers. During the pilot, produced fluid handling issues like tough emulsion formation, lift malfunctioning etc. was not observed. These collective observation indicated success of the ASP pilot project.

There are very few case histories of successful ASP pilot implementation are available, in which the reservoirs has been operating under active aquifer drive. Learning of this ASP project can be taken forward for expansion of ASP flood and also designing of ASP pilot/commercial projects for analogous reservoirs.

The objectives of the present study are to evaluate a zwitterionic surfactant for applicability in EOR. The surfactant was tested in terms of its salt tolerance, thermal stability, interfacial reduction capability, wettability alteration and resistance to adsorption. The effect of salinity and alkalinity was also tested on the above stated physico-chemical properties of the surfactant.

The salt tolerance of the surfactant was tested by testing for precipitation of surfactant solution with increasing salinity at 30 °C and 80 °C. The thermal stability of the surfactant was tested by TGA testing. The interfacial tension of the crude oil and surfactant solution with varying surfactant concentration, salinity and alkalinity was tested by spinning drop technique. The wettability alteration by surfactant solution was tested by measuring contact angle on an oil wet sample. The adsorption study was done by measuring the concentration of surfactant after its solution was exposed to adsorption on crushed rock sample.

The surfactant had salt tolerance of 20% salinity. The surfactant was found stable to 130 °C as per TGA curve. The interfacial tension (IFT) was reduced to ultralow value by surfactant solution for concentration at and above its critical micelle concentration. The presence of salt had minimal effect on the IFT reduction capability of the surfactant solution. Presence of alkali had synergetic effect on IFT reduction. The wettability of the oil wet sample was altered to preferentially water wet by surfactant. The loss of surfactant due to adsorption was found to be within recommenced range for applicability in EOR. These excellent physico-chemical properties of the zwitterionic surfactant suggest that it can be used in the mature oil fields for recovery of trapped oil.

The primary purpose of using traditional friction reducers in stimulation treatments is to overcome the tubular drag while pumping at high flow rates. Hydraulic fracturing is the main technology used to produce hydrocarbon from extremely low permeability rock. Even though slickwater (water fracturing with few chemical additives) used to be one of the most common fracturing fluids, several concerns are still associated with its use, including usage of freshwater, high-cost operation, and environmental issues. Therefore, current practice in hydraulic fracturing is to use alternative fluid systems that are cost effective and have less environmental impact, such as fluids which utilize high viscosity friction reducers (HVFRs), which typically are high molecular weight polyacrylamides. This paper carefully reviews and summarizes over 40 published papers, including experimental work, field case studies, and simulation work. This work summarizes the most recent improvements of using HVFR’s, including capability of carrying proppant, reducing water and chemical requirements, its compatibility with produced water, and environmental benefits in hydraulic fracturing treatments. A further goal is to gain insight into the effective design of HVFR based fluid systems.

The findings of this study are analyzed from over 26 field case studies of many unconventional reservoirs. In comparing to the traditional hydraulic fracture fluids system, the paper summaries many potential advantages offered by HVFR fluids, including: superior proppant transport capability, almost 100% retained conductivity, cost reduction, minimizing chemicals usage by 50%, less operating equipment on location, reducing water consumption by 30%, and fewer environmental concerns. The study also reported that the common HVFR concentration used was 4gpt. HVFRs were used in the field at temperature ranges from 120°F to 340°F. Finally, this work addresses up-to-date challenges and emphasizes necessities for using high viscosity friction reducers as alternative fracture fluids.

The expansion of unconventional resources development has placed emphasis on better understanding of hydraulic fracturing stimulation effectiveness and the area of pay affected by the fracture treatment to optimize well spacing and improve completion and stimulation effectiveness. Existing fracture diagnostic methods such as microseismic monitoring and tiltmeters do not provide information about fracture connectivity to the wellbore. In this paper, we present a chemical tracer flowback based fracture diagnostic and analysis methods to estimate the fractional contribution of each created fracture stage, which is open and connected to the wellbore to help improve field development strategies and provide valuable information on optimal well paths for future drilling and development. The findings out from the stage production contribution profiles using the chemical tracer technology allows engineers to improve stimulation efficiency in multistage hydraulic fracturing horizontal wells applications for completion optimization and production enhancement. Two case histories are presented in which the chemical tracer technology was applied to two horizontal wells. The results of the chemical tracer analysis were correlated to production data, reservoir parameter and other diagnostic tests. The resultant findings from the analysis help evaluate completion and stimulation effectiveness and determine the extent of inter-well connectivity of the fracture network and then used to optimize future completions in the region.

Commonly used fluid loss additives (FLAs) in today's invert emulsion drilling fluids include materials with various attributes. The unmet needs of existing materials may include:

Environmental restrictions due to ecotoxicity or biodegradability concerns

To address these challenges, a FLA was developed for invert emulsion drilling fluids that is made from a renewable raw material and performs at high temperature and high pressure. The renewable raw material used to make this novel FLA is a biopolymer byproduct of the paper pulping process, and was chemically modified under controlled conditions to create a high-performing FLA. Detailed testing was done to determine the additive's performance in different base oils (mineral and diesel), at various mud weights (12 to 16 ppg), at elevated temperatures and in different fluid systems characterized by rheology and high-pressure, high-temperature (HPHT) fluid loss. The novel FLA was compared to other commercially available FLAs for fluid loss performance.

The novel FLA outperformed or was on par with the industry available FLAs tested in this study. The novel FLA realized comparable fluid loss performance of less than 10 ml at 375 F at lower concentrations as compared to the industry FLAs. In some cases, the novel FLA performed at higher temperatures, whereas some of the industry available FLAs did not. The novel FLA also boosted the electrical stability (ES) of the emulsion in certain fluid systems. The novel FLA showed minimum change in the rheology of the oil-based fluids as compared to the industry available FLAs. The novel FLA demonstrated reasonable performance in different mud weights, base oils and fluid systems. Since this novel FLA is derived from a renewable raw material, it may have less of an environmental impact compared to other FLAs utilized today.

The novel FLA:

Was developed from a renewable raw material for invert emulsion drilling fluids;

The recent and rapid success of using high viscosity friction reducers (HVFRs) in hydraulic fracturing treatments is due to several advantages over other fracture fluids (e.g. linear gel), which include better proppant carrying capability, induce more complex fracture system network with higher fracture length, and overall lower costs due to fewer chemicals and less equipment on location. However, some concerns remain, like how HVFRs rheological properties can have impact on proppant transport into fractures. The objective of this study is to provide a comprehensive understanding of the influence the rheological characterization of HVFRs have on proppant static settling velocity within hydraulic fracturing process. To address these concerns, comprehensive rheological tests including viscosity profile, elasticity profile, and thermal stability were conducted for both HVFR and linear gel. In the steady shear-viscosity measurement, viscosity behavior versus a wide range of shear rates was studied. Moreover, the influence of elasticity was examined by performing oscillatory-shear tests over the range of frequencies. Normal stress was the other elasticity factor examined to evaluate elastic properties. Also, the Weissenberg number was calculated to determine the elastic to viscous forces. Lastly, quantitative and qualitative measurements were carried out to study proppant settling velocity in the fluids made from HVFRs and linear gel. The results of rheological measurement reveal that a lower concentration of HVFR-2 loading at 2gpt has approximately more than 8 times the viscosity of linear gel loading at 20ppt. Elastic measurement exposes that generally HVFRs have a much higher relaxation time compared to linear gel. Interestingly, the normal stress N1 of HVFR-2, 2gpt was over 3 times that of linear gel loading 20ppt. This could conclude that linear gel fracture fluids have weak elastic characterization compared to HVFR. The results also concluded that at 80 C° linear gel has a weak thermal stability while HVFR-2 loses its properties only slightly with increasing temperature. HVFR-2 showed better proppant settling velocity relative to guar-based fluids. The reduction on proppant settling velocity exceed 75% when HVFR-2 loading at 2gpt was used compared to 20ppt of linear gel. Even though much work was performed to understand the proppant settling velocity, not much experimental work has investigated the HVFR behavior on the static proppant settling velocity measurements. This paper will provide a better understanding of the distinct changes of the mechanical characterization on the HVFRs which could be used as guidance for fracture engineers to design and select better high viscous friction reducers.

Enhanced Oil Recovery is important stage of life cycle of a field and often it is implemented with challenges. In the chemical EOR, challenges and surprises are expected in production chemistry and production facilities operations. Partially hydrolyzed polyacrylamide used widely for controlling mobility ratio so that Operator is able to recover maximum possible oil. With complex water chemistry and rich in positively charged divalent ions, flooded polymer having negative charge interacts with divalent ions of produced water. Back produced sheared polymer interacts with divalent ions to form semi hard to hard scales poses challenges of the reliability of production facilities.

Other important limitations to be noted in CEOR phase are using production chemicals to control scale, emulsion and microbial treatment under Hydrogen Sulphide and waxy crude environment. This paper discusses about the requirement of preparedness and how to overcome challenges of EOR operations and in handling the back produced polymer in following areas:

Selection of production chemicals to be compatible to polymer so that no or minimal degradation or loss of viscosity due to polarity of chemicals

In-situ gelled acids have been used for acid diversion in heterogeneous carbonate reservoirs for more than two decades. Most of the gelled systems are based on an anionic polymer that has a cleaning problem after the acid treatments that leads to formation damage. This work evaluates a new cationic-polymer acid system with the self-breaking ability for the application as an acid divergent in carbonate reservoirs.

Experimental studies have been conducted to examine the rheological properties of the polymer-based acid systems. The apparent viscosities of the live and the partially neutralized acids at pH from 0 to 5 were measured against the shear rate (0 to 1,000 s^-1). The impact of salinity and temperature (80 to 250°F) on the rheological properties of the acid system was also studied. The viscoelastic properties of the gelled acid system were evaluated using an oscillatory rheometer. Dynamic sweep tests were used to determine the elastic (G’) and viscous modulus (G") of the system. Single coreflood experiments were conducted on Indiana limestone cores to study the nature of diversion caused by the polymer-acid system. The impact of permeability contrast on the process of diversion was investigated by conducting dual coreflood experiments on Indiana limestone cores which had a permeability contrast of 1.5-20. CT scans were conducted to study the propagation of wormhole post acid injection for both single and dual corefloods.

The live acid system displayed a non-Newtonian shear-thinning behavior with the viscosity declining with temperature. For 5 wt% HCl and 20 gpt polymer content at 10 s^-1, the viscosity decreased from 230 to 40 cp with temperature increasing from 88 to 250°F. Acid spending tests demonstrated that the acid generated a gel with a significant improvement in viscosity to 260 cp (at 250°F and 10 s^-1) after it reached a pH of 2. The highly viscous gel plugged the wormhole and forced the acid that followed to the next higher permeability zone. The viscosity of gel continued to increase until it broke down to 69 cp (at 250°F and 10 s^-1) at a pH of 4.8, which provides a self-breaking system and better cleaning. Coreflood studies indicated that the wormhole and the diversion process is dependent on the temperature and the flow rate. There was no indication of any damage caused by the system. The injected acid volume to breakthrough (PVBT) decreased from 2.2 to 1.4 when the temperature increased from 150 to 250°F.

The strong elastic nature of the gel (G’= 3.976 Pa at 1 Hz) formed by the partially neutralized acid system proves its suitability as a candidate for use as a diverting agent. This novel acid-polymer system has significant promise for usage in acid diversion to improve stimulation of carbonate reservoirs.

Produced water is an inextricable part of the hydrocarbon recovery processes. Safe and environmentally benign disposal of produced water is a major concern for all the oil fields across the world in the present low cost and stringent environmental & statutory compliance era. Many technology available in the market to treat produced water oil contaminants but economical treatment of heavy metal content is still a great challenges for oil industries for safe disposal.

Therefore, New innovative technology i.e. Reed bed technology has been adopted in Heglig field of Sudan to treat the produced water and heavy metal economically through phytoremediation. After successful implementation in Heglig oil field, it is being implemented in other surrounding oil field also.

It is probably a world largest Phytoremediation/Bio-remediation system using Reed Bed technology operating successfully for last 15 years. It is environmental friendly, solar energy driven clean up techniques. This paper not only elucidate, how reed bed removes oil contaminants and heavy metals but also provide clear picture of how this project provide shelter for flora, fauna, other species that help to maintain ecological and environmental balance. Research has also demonstrated that reed-bed technology is feasible and resilient in treating oil produced water

High viscosity friction reducers (HVFRs) are an important component of slickwater hydraulic fracturing applications. To continue to treat multiple clusters effectively within longer laterals, even for stages near the toe area, a high molecular weight HVFR polymer, such as polyacrylamide, is commonly used to overcome pipe friction at 1 gal/Mgal or lower. To carry proppant into fractures, it is commonly assumed that the higher viscosity the HVFR yields, the better the proppant transport, necessitating higher HVFR concentrations than 1 gal/Mgal. However, a field study within the Anadarko Basin demonstrates that viscosity is not necessarily the best indicator of how efficiently HVFRs carry proppant. Instead, HVFR elasticity might play a more important role during proppant transport. Secondly, HVFRs concentration of 1 gal/Mgal or higher could potentially plug the proppant pack or form a filter cake on the rock surface, causing formation damage. Although previous laboratory methods to determine potential formation damage exist, results are difficult to correlate with field applications; hence, the conclusions remain elusive. A relatively new analysis procedure yielding improved assessments of residual HVFR concentrations for both flowback and produced waters, which aid understanding potential formation damage after hydraulic fracturing, is discussed.