CO2 Enhanced Oil Recovery

and Storage in Reservoirs

CHE384-Energy Technology and Policy

Xi Chen

Nov. 19th, 2007

EOR-Background
 Primary recovery
 Natural pressure, 10% OOIP
 Secondary recovery
 Injection of water or gas, 20-40% OOIP
 Tertiary or enhanced oil recovery
 Aiming at recovery of 30%-60% OOIP
Categories of EOR
 Thermal recovery
 Steam flooding, ~50% of EOR production
 Chemical injection
 Polymer/water flooding, <1%
 Gas injection ~50%
 immiscible flooding: CH4, N2
 miscible flooding : CO2
Ult. Recovery
Process Utilization Lecture notes
% OOIP
Miscible 10-15 10 MCF/bbl
from
Immiscible 5-10 10 MCF/bbl Dr. Larry W. Lake
EOR by CO2 flooding
Advantages of CO2 flooding
 Dense fluid over much of the range of
pressure and temperature in reservoirs
 Low MMP (minimum miscibility pressure) and
high miscibility with oil
 Low mutual solubility with water
 Low cost and abundance
 Naturally occuring source
 Environmental benefit if industrial CO2 is
used and stored in reservoirs
 Capture and sequestration of CO2 from
combustion of fossil fuel
 Source: Oil & Gas Journal

206,000 barrels per day in 2004 = 4% of the Nation’s total.

Screening criteria for application
of CO2 miscible flood

Gozalpour, “CO2 EOR and Storage in Oil Reservoirs”, 2005,

Oil & Gas Science and Technology – Rev. IFP,
Vol. 60 (2005), No. 3, pp. 537-546
Optimum reservoir parameters and weighting factors
for ranking oil reservoirs suitable for CO2 EOR

Rivas, O. et al. (1992) Ranking Reservoirs for Carbon Dioxide

Flooding Processes.
Technical challenge
 Poor sweep efficiency
 Gravity override
 Mobility contrast
 Reservoir heterogeneity
 CO2 related problem
 Corrosion on facilities
 Solid deposition in reservoir formation
 Well spacing
 Greater spacing causes sweep efficiency reduction
CO2 mobility control
 Foam
 mixed surfactants as foaming agent
 Thickening agent
 Fluorinated compound or polymer (good
solubility in CO2)
 Chemical gels
 In-situ gelation of polymer to lower
permeability
CO2 Storage in Reservoirs

 Most favorable site for storage

 Dense webs of seismic and well for long-
term trap
 Surface and subsurface infrastructure
readily converted for CO2 distribution and
injection
 Less costly
CO2 Storage in Reservoirs
 CO2 capacity of a reservoir:
 Theoretically, equal to the volume
previously occupied by the produced oil
and water
 Other factor: Water invasion, gravity
segregation, reservoir heterogeneity and
CO2 dissolution
 Reservoir type, depth, size and safety of
CO2 storage
Economics
 Cost of CO2 from different sources:
 Naturally occuring CO2: $14/t
 Pure anthropogenic CO2 from chemical plant: $18/t
 Capture and processing of CO2 from coal fired plant: $18-
54/t Lako, P. (2002) Options for CO2 Sequestration and Enhanced
Fuel Supply.

 CO2 utilization efficiency: 4~8 Mscf/bbl

(0.2~0.5t/bbl)
 Transportation cost: $0.5~1.2/Mscf
 Operation cost: $2-3/bbl
 Economical even at a oil price of $40/bbl.
 CO2 storage credit ($2.5/Mscf) makes it more
economical for producers.
Summary
 Combination of CO2 EOR and storage in
reservoirs provides a bridge between
reducing greenhouse gases from industrial
waste streams and the beneficial use of CO2
injection for increasing oil and gas recovery.