CBE 555: Chemical EngineeringConnections:

Impact of Chemical Engineering on the

Outside World

Tertiary Oil Recovery

Steve Ng Kim Hoong

16 October 2007

Outline of This Presentation

Reasons for supporting tertiary oil recovery

Primary Oil Recovery
Secondary Oil Recovery
Tertiary Oil Recovery
-

Thermal Processes
Miscible Processes
Chemical Processes
Biological Processes

Why are we doing this??

$86 per barrel of crude oil
Primary oil recovery can only recover 10
percent of a reservoirs original oil in place
Secondary oil recovery 20 to 40 percent
Tertiary oil recovery 30 to 60 percent
Undeveloped domestic oil resources still in the
ground total more than 430 billion barrels.

Primary Oil Recovery

The initial stage of producing
oil from a reservoir
Use natural forces such as
- expansion of oil, gas or both
- displacement by naturally
pressurized water
- drainage from a reservoir in
high elevation to a well in
lower elevation
- artificial techniques (pumps)

Secondary Oil Recovery

Injection of fluids in a
series of wells to
force oil into another
series of wells
(essentially
augmenting the
natural forces used in
primary methods)
Waterflooding

Thermal Processes
Viscosity is a measure of a liquids ability to
flow
High viscosity of oil makes it difficult to flow
Reduce the viscosity with high temperature
Steam Injection
- Cyclic steam injection
- Steam drive

Cyclic Steam Injection

High pressure of steam (or

steam and hot water) injected
into well for days/weeks
Injection is stopped and the
reservoir is soaked
Well is then allowed to
backflow to surface
Condensed steam/ hot water
vaporizes to drive oil out
When production is low,
process is repeated
Huff and Puff method

Steam Drive
Steam flooding
Same method as water
flooding
Continuous injection of
steam (or steam and hot
water)
A reservoir is developed
with interlocking patterns
of injection and production
wells
Series of zones
developed as the fluids
move from injection wells
to production wells

Miscible Processes

Injected fluid dissolves the oil that it contacts

Variety of fluid:
- Alcohol
- Carbon dioxide
- Petroleum hydrocarbons (propane, propane-butane)
- Petroleum gasses (ethane, propane, butane, pentane)
Fluid selectivity depends on the type of reservoir and
crude oil
Expensive fluid (supplementary process to recover fluid
or use it sparingly)
Slug 5% to 50% of reservoir volume pushed through
by gas/water brine or chemically treated brine

CO2 Enhanced Oil Recovery

All the petroleum hydrocarbons are expensive (not viable in economic sense)
CO2 is cheap and widely available (mostly use natural CO2 deposits)
Complete mixing depends on reservoir temperature, pressure, chemical nature and
density of oil
Generally, its deeper than 1200m and oil lighter than 220 API
CO2 is stable in supercritical state (6.9 MPa and 310C)
Injected CO2 will diminish the interfacial tension between itself and the crude oil

Chemical Processes
Involved the usage of surfactant/polymer,
polymer, alkaline flooding
Surfactant/polymer flooding:
- microemulsion/micellar flooding
- detergent-like material injected to modify
the oil interactions with its surroundings
- emulsify/partly dissolve oil
- high cost, small volume

 Polymer flooding
- a chemically augmented waterflood
- polyacrylamides/polysaccharides
- increase effectiveness of water in displacing oil
Alkaline flooding
- sodium hydroxide, sodium silicate, sodium
carbonate
- react with constituents in the crude oil or
rock/crude oil interface
- detergent-like material to reduce the ability of
the formation to retain oil

Biological Processes

Utilize microbes to enhance oil recovery

Occupy pore spaces to release trapped oil and reduce water cut
Microbial response:
- larger
- shrink
- oleophilic
- attach and surround oil droplets
- deform droplets to form smaller droplets
- smaller droplets able to escape pore spaces
- byproduct of metabolism (CO2 and biomass)
- biosurfactants (slimy substances exopolysaccharides)
- Xanthomans campestris bacteria (Xantan)
Reservoir response:
- microbes attached to water and oil droplets move faster through high permeable
sections of the field (thief zones). This combination and fast flow creates a natural
emulsion only in the thief zones.
- thief zones are temporarily blocked
- water is diverted to unswept areas of the field, thus increasing sweeping efficiency

Case Study:
Beatrice Field, North Sea, England
The Beatrice Field is in a steep North Sea
production decline
Scheduled to be abandoned in 1995-96
Applied the microbial enhanced oil
recovery (Titan Process) from 1992-95
Oil production scheduled to decline to
5000 bopd (now producing 12000 bopd)
5.5 million barrels of excess oil was
produced

REFERENCES
http://www.titanoilrecovery.com/pdfs/TitanBrochure.pdf
http://www.biobasics.gc.ca/english/View.asp?x=793
http://www.fossil.energy.gov/programs/oilgas/eor/index.ht
ml
Enhanced Oil Recovery Potential in the United States,
Congress of the United States, Office of Technology
Assessment, January 1978, #PB-276594
Enhanced Oil Recovery Scoping Study, A. Amamath,
1999

THANK YOU!!