Investigating the CO₂ injection and the performance of nanoparticles in preventing formation damage at different pressures and concentrations

Abstract

Asphaltene deposition is one of the main challenges during CO2 injection (miscible or immiscible) into reservoirs. Asphaltene deposition reduces the porosity and permeability of reservoir rock and changes its wettability to strongly oil‐wet. In this article, to control the asphaltene deposition during CO2 injection the use of direct asphaltene inhibitors (Al2O3 and Fe3O4) in reservoir conditions. In this research, nanoparticle screening (to investigate its significance in reducing asphaltene precipitation) has been done and it can be stated that Al2O3 nanoparticle will perform better effectivity than Fe3O4 nanoparticle. After that, by using effective nanoparticles (Al2O3) in different concentrations (1000 and 2000 ppm), the amount of asphaltene deposition during CO2 injection has been investigated. The obtained results show that increasing the injection pressure (from immiscible to miscible) causes an increase in asphaltene deposition and the use of nanoparticles will reduce the amount of asphaltene deposition.