Nanoparticle-Fortified Emulsification of Heavy Oil

ABSTRACT

Chemical flooding has been suggested as an efficient conformance control technique to develop many of thin post-CHOPS heavy oil reservoirs in Western Canada. In-situ formation of oil in water emulsions due to the effect of surfactant/natural soap has been reported as the main mechanism behind chemical EOR. In this work, the effect of surface-modified silica NPs to enhance the efficiency of surfactant to emulsify heavy oil (14,850 mPa.s and 980 kg/m³ at 25 °C, from the Luseland field) in water has been investigated.

Bulk fluid screening experiments were conducted using different surfactants and surface-modified silica NPs for selecting the best heavy oil emulsifier. Complementary experiments such as interfacial/surface tension, NP zeta potential and size measurements, and elemental analysis were conducted to understand the interactions between NPs and surfactant molecules.

In the absence of NPs, concentration of both anionic and cationic surfactants should be tuned within a narrow window, near CMC, to create stable heavy oil in water emulsions. It was found that there is a threshold for IFT, obtained at the CMC, which should be met to have stable oil in water emulsions. The created oil in water emulsions break easily at surfactant concentrations higher than the CMC, yielding IFTs higher than the threshold. This observation was also seen in a system containing dodecane. At the CMC of both anionic and cationic surfactants, the IFT between dodecane and an aqueous phase is negative, producing stable dodecane in water emulsions for over three months.

In the presence of surface-modified silica NPs heavy oil emulsification is achieved at surfactant concentrations much lower than the CMC. In this case, IFT is remarkably (54 %) reduced, well below the threshold value, due to the combined effect of 2 wt. % negatively-charged silica NPs and only 0.1 wt. % anionic surfactant. These results suggest that the repulsive interaction between negatively-charged NPs and anionic surfactant may result in pushing the surfactant molecules back towards the oil-water interface to enhance IFT reduction.

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