Experimental investigation of immiscible supercritical carbon dioxide foam rheology for improved oil recovery

Shehzad Ahmed*, Khaled Abdalla Elraies, Jalal Forooozesh, Siti Rohaida Bt Mohd Shafian, Muhammad Rehan Hashmet, Ivy Chai Ching Hsia, Abdullah Almansour

*Corresponding author for this work

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    Abstract

    This paper presents the rheological behaviour of supercritical CO2 (sCO2) foam at reservoir conditions of 1 500 psi and 80 °C. Different commercial surfactants were screened and utilized in order to generate a fairly stable CO2 foam. Mixed surfactant system was also introduced to generate strong foam. Foam rheology was studied for some specific foam qualities using a high pressure high temperature (HPHT) foam loop rheometer. A typical shear thinning behaviour of the foam was observed and a significant increase in the foam viscosity was noticed with the increase of foam quality until 85%. A desired high apparent viscosity with coarse texture was found at 85% foam quality. Foam visualization above 85% showed an unstable foam due to extremely thin lamella which collapsed and totally disappeared in the loop rheometer. Below 52%, a non-homogenous and unstable foam was found having low viscosity with some liquid accumulation at the bottom of the circulation loop. This research has demonstrated rheology of sCO2 foams at different qualities at HPHT to obtain optimal foam quality region for immiscible CO2 foam co-injection process.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)835-841
    Number of pages7
    JournalJournal of Earth Science
    Volume28
    Issue number5
    Early online date13 Oct 2017
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 31 Oct 2017

    Keywords

    • apparent viscosity
    • foam quality
    • foam stability
    • supercritical CO foam

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