Coupling the Alkaline-Surfactant-Polymer Technology and the Gelation Technology to Maximize Oil Production

Abstract

Gelation technologies have been developed to provide more efficient vertical sweep efficiencies for flooding naturally fractured oil reservoirs or more efficient areal sweep efficiency for those with high permeability contrast "thief zones". The field proven alkaline-surfactant-polymer technology economically recovers 15% to 25% OOIP more oil than waterflooding from swept pore space of an oil reservoir. However, alkaline-surfactant-polymer technology is not amenable to naturally fractured reservoirs or those with thief zones because much of injected solution bypasses target pore space containing oil. This work investigates whether combining these two technologies could broaden applicability of alkaline-surfactant-polymer flooding into these reservoirs.A prior fluid-fluid report discussed interaction of different gel chemical compositions and alkaline-surfactant-polymer solutions. Gel solutions under dynamic conditions of linear corefloods showed similar stability to alkaline-surfactant-polymer solutions as in the fluid-fluid analyses. Aluminum-polyacrylamide, flowing gels are not stable to alkaline-surfactant-polymer solutions of either pH 10.5 or 12.9. Chromium acetate-polyacrylamide flowing and rigid flowing gels are stable to subsequent alkaline-surfactant-polymer solution injection. Rigid flowing chromium acetate-polyacrylamide gels maintained permeability reduction better than flowing chromium acetate-polyacrylamide gels. Silicate-polyacrylamide gels are not stable with subsequent injection of either a pH 10.5 or a 12.9 alkaline-surfactant-polymer solution. Chromium acetate-xanthan gum rigid gels are not stable to subsequent alkaline-surfactantpolymer solution injection. Resorcinol-formaldehyde gels were stable to subsequent alkalinesurfactant-polymer solution injection. When evaluated in a dual core configuration, injected fluid flows into the core with the greatest effective permeability to the injected fluid. The same gel stability trends to subsequent alkaline-surfactant-polymer injected solution were observed.Aluminum citrate-polyacrylamide, resorcinol-formaldehyde, and the silicate-polyacrylamide gel systems did not produce significant incremental oil in linear corefloods. Both flowing and rigid flowing chromium acetate-polyacrylamide gels and the xanthan gum-chromium acetate gel system produced incremental oil with the rigid flowing gel producing the greatest amount. Higher oil recovery could have been due to higher differential pressures across cores. None of the gels tested appeared to alter alkaline-surfactant-polymer solution oil recovery. Total waterflood plus chemical flood oil recovery sequence recoveries were all similar.