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Resolving an Enhanced Oil Recovery Challenge: Optimum Formulation of a Surfactant-Oil–Water System Made Insensitive to Dilution

  • Original Article
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Journal of Surfactants and Detergents

Abstract

Upon dilution by the petroleum reservoir connate water, the anionic commercial surfactant blend often used in enhanced oil recovery by low tension, becomes more lipophilic at the interface because of so-called selective partitioning. Hence, the optimum formulation is not maintained when the injected slug moves through the reservoir. An opposite variation is found for ethoxylated nonionic surfactant systems. As a consequence of these antagonistic influences, the optimum formulation shift produced by dilution may be eliminated by using an appropriate mixture of anionic and nonionic commercial surfactants, so that the two effects exactly cancel out.

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Abbreviations

SAD:

Surfactant affinity difference defined in Eqs. (1) and (2)

HLD:

Hydrophilic-lipophilic deviation defined in Eqs. (1) and (2)

ACN:

Alkane carbon number

PSMW425:

Petroleum sulfonate sodium salt with an average molecular weight of 425

PSHL:

Petroleum sulfonate sodium salt with a molecular weight range of 440 to 470

C12OXS:

Dodecyl orthoxylene sulfonate sodium salt

NP6EO:

Commercial ethoxylated nonylphenol with an average of 6 ethylene oxide groups

EON:

Average number of ethylene oxide groups per molecule

S :

Salinity of aqueous phase (in wt% NaCl)

σ :

Characteristic parameter of an anionic surfactant

β :

Characteristic parameter of a nonionic surfactant

f(A) and ϕ(A):

Functions representing the effect of the type and concentration of alcohol

T :

Temperature (° C)

k, b, aT, cT:

Constants (see Refs. 4, 6, 10, 12)

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Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to their university research council CDCHT, for a partial financial backing. One of the authors (MAA) would like to thank FONACIT, an agency of the Venezuelan Ministry of Science and Technology for granting her a doctoral scholarship.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Lab. FIRP, Ingeniería Química, Universidad de Los Andes, Mérida, 5101, Venezuela

    María Antonieta Arandia, Ana María Forgiarini & Jean-Louis Salager

Authors
  1. María Antonieta Arandia
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  2. Ana María Forgiarini
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  3. Jean-Louis Salager
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Correspondence to Ana María Forgiarini.

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Arandia, M.A., Forgiarini, A.M. & Salager, JL. Resolving an Enhanced Oil Recovery Challenge: Optimum Formulation of a Surfactant-Oil–Water System Made Insensitive to Dilution. J Surfact Deterg 13, 119–126 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11743-009-1171-1

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