Regular Article
Assessment of xanthan gum and xanthan-g-silica derivatives as chemical flooding agents and rock wettability modifiers
1
Department of Petroleum Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, British University in Egypt (BUE), Elshorouk City, Cairo 11837, Egypt
2
Department of Production, Egyptian Petroleum Research Institute, Naser City, Cairo 11727, Egypt
3
Faculty of Energy and Environmental Engineering, British University in Egypt (BUE), Elshorouk City, Cairo 11837, Egypt
* Corresponding author: ahmed.abdelhafez@bue.edu.eg
Received:
22
August
2019
Accepted:
20
January
2020
Currently, biomolecules flooding in the underground reservoirs acquires sustainable interest owing to their availability and eco-friendly properties. The current study reported chemical displacement by xanthan gum as well as xanthan/SiO2 and xanthan grafted with vinylsilane derivatives. Chemical characterization evaluated by traditional spectroscopic methods. Investigation of fluids response to reservoir environment assessed through rheological performance relative to shearing rate, ionic strength, and thermal stability. A sequence of flooding runs generated on 10 sandstone outcrops with different porosity and permeabilities. Core wetness assessed through relative permeability curves at different water saturation. The flooding tests indicate that grafting of the silica derivative overcome the shortage of xanthan solution in flooding operations relative to the reservoir conditions. The ability of the flooding solutions to alter rock wettability explored through relative permeability curves at different water saturation. The results reveal that the synthesized composite was a promised agent for enhancing oil recovery and profile conformance.
© A. Ashraf Soliman et al., published by IFP Energies nouvelles, 2020
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.