Microfluidic Study of the Effect of Nanosuspensions on Enhanced Oil Recovery

Abstract

The essential advantages of microfluidic studies are the excellent visualization of the processes of oil displacement from the porous medium model, simple cleaning, and the possibility of the repeated use of the microfluidic chip. The present article deals with the process of oil displacement by suspension flooding using a microfluidic chip, simulating a porous medium, and the suspensions of silicon dioxide nanoparticles (22 nm). The mass concentration of nanoparticles in suspensions ranged from 0.1 to 2 wt%. Five mass concentrations (0.125 wt%, 0.25 wt%, 0.5 wt%, 1 wt% and 2 wt%) were considered. The article presents the experimental photographs of the oil displacement process by water and SiO2 suspension. It is shown that, with the increasing concentration of nanoparticles, the oil recovery factor increases. A significant effect is observed at 0.5 wt% concentration of nanoparticles. It is shown that the increase in oil recovery during flooding by SiO2 suspension with the maximum concentration was 16%.

Experimental Investigation of Magnetorheological Behavior of Fe3O4@PVP@OA Ferrofluid for Potential Application in Gas Condensate Blockage Reduction

“…This trend is more likely related to the presence and the gradual evacuation of air inside the micromodel resulting in a pressure drop during the measurement. Furthermore, the addition of the magnetic nanoparticles from 5 to 10 wt % affects the pressure drop in the micromodel, as increasing the concentration of nanoparticles causes an increase in the time of breakthrough within the porosity of the micromodel leading to a decrease in the pressure drop as seen in Figure (c) . This may be related to a change in liquid–solid wetting properties because the surfactant used to stabilize nanoparticles tends to lower the surface tension in comparison to a pure carrier (kerosene).…”

“…Furthermore, the addition of the magnetic nanoparticles from 5 to 10 wt % affects the pressure drop in the micromodel, as increasing the concentration of nanoparticles causes an increase in the time of breakthrough within the porosity of the micromodel leading to a decrease in the pressure drop as seen in Figure 16(c). 76 This may be related to a change in liquid− solid wetting properties because the surfactant used to stabilize nanoparticles tends to lower the surface tension in comparison to a pure carrier (kerosene). In fact, the modified nanoparticles adhered on the surface can cause a complex dynamic wetting property and consequently a change in flow property.…”

Experimental study of the low salinity water injection process in the presence of scale inhibitor and various nanoparticles

“…As mentioned above, many parameters affect the efficiency of oil displacement in the porous media when using nanoparticles (Peng et al 2017;Eltoum et al 2021;Pryazhnikov et al 2022). In this section, the influence of the concentration and type of nanoparticles, as two main parameters, on the oil recovery factor was evaluated.…”

“…It is important to consider which parameters have a significant influence on the LSWI process using nanoparticles in order to enhance its efficiency. Some of them are as follows: size, type, concentration, and stability of nanoparticles, surface coating by nanoparticles, density, injection time and rate, temperature, rock wettability, and permeability (Hendraningrat et al 2013;Roustaei and Bagherzadeh 2015;Ehtesabi et al 2015;Peng et al 2017;Sun et al 2017;Eltoum et al 2021;Pryazhnikov et al 2022). The adsorption of nanoparticles on the surface of the reservoir rock affects its surface charge, thereby changing the wetting characteristics (Ali et al 2019;Malgaresi et al 2019).…”

Effect of the SiO2 Nanoparticle Size on Application of Enhanced Oil Recovery in Medium-Permeability Formations

“…NPs exhibit a high surface-to-volume ratio and high electrostatic repulsion ascribed to their small size, which make them disperse more stably in solutions and easily enter the narrow pore throat of the reservoir . Generally, an added suspension with NPs (usually a water-based suspension) is considered a nanofluid; the application of it after water flooding in improving oil recovery is being actively studied due to the excellent interface properties.…”