Polymer-Assisted-Water-Alternating-Gas for Improving the CO₂ Flow Properties in Porous Media

CO₂ flow in porous media is vital for both enhanced oil recovery and underground carbon storage. For improving CO₂ mobility control and thus improved reservoir sweep efficiency, Water-Alternating-Gas (WAG) injection has often been applied. The effectiveness of WAG diminishes, however, due to the presence of micro-scale...

Fundamentals and Recent Progress in the Flow of Water-Soluble Polymers in Porous Media for Enhanced Oil Recovery

Due to increased energy demand, it is vital to enhance the recovery from existing oilfields. Polymer flooding is the most frequently used chemical enhanced oil recovery (cEOR) method in field applications that increases the oil sweep and displacement efficiencies. In recent years, there has been growing interest to assess the use of polymer...

Effect of nanoparticles and pre-shearing on the performance of water-soluble polymers flow in porous media

Polymer flooding is a commercially viable chemical enhanced oil recovery (cEOR) method. It includes the injection of water-soluble polymers into a reservoir to improve the drive water viscosity and consequently to increase the sweep and displacement efficiency of the water. Despite the success in both laboratory and field applications, there are...

Effect of electrostatic interaction on the retention and remobilization of colloidal particles in porous media

We investigate the effect of pH on external hematite colloidal particles entrapment and remobilization by core-flood experiments combined with X ray computed tomography. Suspensions of calibrated hematite colloidal particles were injected into Bentheimer sandstones sample, composed mainly of well-sorted quartz and small clay fraction (up to 1...

Flow enhancement of water-soluble polymers through porous media by preshearing

We examine the role of preshearing on the flow properties of polymer solutions containing essentially an acrylamide-based copolymer obtained from an emulsified polymer emulsion inverted by a surfactant. The polymer solutions were presheared using three methods: (1) a Buddeberg disperser, (2) an Ultra-Turrax disperser, and (3) pressure-driven...

Rheological response of a modified polyacrylamide–silica nanoparticles hybrid at high salinity and temperature

Water-soluble polyacrylamides have often been used to modify flow response in various water-based technologies and industrial processes, including paints, water treatment, paper manufacturing, and chemical enhanced oil recovery. Polymers are susceptible to degradation at combined high salinity and elevated temperature conditions which limits...