A Review on Research Areas in Enhanced oil recovery

Abstract
Enhanced oil recovery (EOR) spans a wide area of research to increase oil reserves and production. This article is a general review on enhanced oil recovery (EOR) and research problems. Although the focus of EOR is to inject fluid or fluids to reduce surface tension and increase the swept area, a multitude of problems are faced when processes are to be applied to reservoirs which are usually complex in structure and located in increasingly harsh areas. Using current EOR technology, extraction of oil approaches 50% of the oil in place. More research is needed to find methods that are effective and cheap.

Keywords: Enhanced oil recovery, drive mechanisms, surface tension, water injection, research Background
Although claims that the Chinese and other old civilisations had used some kind of fluid from the ground for fuel a long time ago, the industry as is known today has its beginning in Titusville, a small town in Pennsylvania, where the first oil well was drilled in 1859 by the Drake oil company. [1] At 69.5 feet, it was just as deep as many water wells in some countries today. Although in the sixties, the price of oil was in the one or two USD range, in 1795-1800, crude oil was quoted as USD16. [1] If the price were to be compared with the price of gold, which was about USD19 per ounce in 1800 [2], then the price of oil today at more than USD100 per barrel is undervalued since the price of gold was USD914 in January 2008 . However, the aim of this paper is not to predict the price of oil, which has never followed predictions, but to review enhanced oil recovery (EOR) and present research opportunities either directly or indirectly related to EOR processes. Nevertheless in any industry, the economic viability of a process is just as important as the results it delivers. Therefore EOR discussion will always be related to the price of oil. The oil industry has always operated in remote regions, and small towns often mushroomed with the industry. Those were the times of what is now termed 'easy oil' when reservoirs are large, shallow and, if offshore, shallow water. For example the Ghawar field in Saudi Arabia found in 1948 is 230 km by 30 km with reservoirs reaching 1300 ft thick. [3] Nowadays, fields are found in even more uninhabitable places such as Sakhalin where the temperatures are below zero for most of the year. Reservoirs off the Brazilian coast and east coast of Sabah are found where water depths are one to two km. It is therefore not surprising that the cost of one well can be as high as USD120 million. Enhanced oil recovery is an attractive alternative to finding new sources since at least 50% of oil still remains in the ground after a reservoir has been produced. The challenge is to produce at an economical rate.

Oil Production and Drives

Before any process to produce oil or gas is chosen, the characteristics of a reservoir must be identified since production depends on the type of reservoir. Reservoirs are porous media mostly made of sandstone and carbonates. Oil reservoirs containing only oil and water in the pores exist when the reservoir pressure is higher than the bubble point pressure and is known as undersaturated reservoirs. When oil is produced from this type of reservoir, the reduced reservoir pressure causes liquid to expand thereby causing the oil to be pushed to the well. If the pressure drops below the bubble point, gas that exists as dissolved gas in the oil and water phases is liberated, providing more force but at the same time will be removed with the oil. This driving force or drive mechanism is weak and usually less than 5% of oil can be

recovered under expansion drive. Under water drive, a higher recovery can be obtained since the reservoir is supported by an aquifer. The presence of gas cap in saturated reservoirs results in gas cap drive which gives a higher recovery than expansion drive. It increases the expulsive drive during primary recovery by expanding when the reservoir pressure drops. When a reservoir has an aquifer and a gas cap, the recovery will also be higher [Fig. 1]. Primary recovery is production occurring as a natural process. However, primary recovery alone produces less than 30% of oil for most reservoirs, even with many types of drives. Dake [4] and Craft et al [5] are excellent references on reservoir behaviour.

for oil companies to institute pressure maintenance by either water or gas injection from the beginning of production. Consequently, the terms secondary and tertiary often became difficult to differentiate. EOR now is generally accepted as the processes that involve injection of fluid or fluids. IOR is any process that increases production and reserves (commercially recoverable deposits) which means it includes among others EOR, fracturing reservoir rocks to improve flow, cleaning up wells to increase production rate, drilling more wells, improving seismic process etc. The term augmented recovery is sometimes encountered but it had not taken off in the industry. More detailed description of EOR processes can be found in van Poollen [6] and Latil [7].

EOR, IOR or augmented recovery

Water injection was used initially to maintain or increase reservoir pressure after primary production. Areal sweep is improved when a few wells, in a pattern, are used for injection to push oil from many directions towards the production well (Fig 2).This process is called water flooding. The problem with water as a displacing fluid is the lower viscosity when compared with most oils. Water being more mobile then tends to bypass the oil. Polymer can be added to the water, giving rise to polymer flooding. Gas injection is another method to increase the pressure and is usually used in reservoirs with gas cap. Under primary production, the gas cap expands pushing the oil towards the production well. Injection of gas into the gas cap helps to maintain the drive. A reservoir is abandoned when the rate of oil produced becomes uneconomical and the amounts of gas and water produced are high compared with oil flow rate.

Rock-fluid attraction

attraction

and

fluid-fluid

Enhanced Oil recovery, EOR vs. Improved Oil recovery, IOR

Secondary recovery was the term applied to waterflooding, hot water flooding and steam flooding. Any other injection process after secondary recovery was called tertiary recovery. However, it is now a standard practice

Oil and gas reservoirs are porous media which contain two or three fluids. The way the reservoirs were formed resulted in the presence of water in the pores, known as connate water or interstitial water in all reservoirs. When a reservoir is found, the water is assumed to be present but immobile. The attraction between fluid and rock surface determines the wettability of the rocks. If water covers the rock surface while the oil phase is enclosed or separated by water from the rock surface, then the system is water wet. This type of rocks allows oil to flow easier than water. Conversely, an oil wet reservoir will attract oil to its surface instead of flowing to the well. When fluid is injected to expel oil, the amount of oil recovered is related to the driving force as described earlier and also the attraction between the oil /rock surface and other fluids i.e. surface tension. Consequently, a property of the injected fluid is to reduce surface tension such as surfactant or to induce miscibility with oil such as liquid CO2, resulting in zero surface tension. Other properties include no reaction with the rocks or minerals in the rocks, ability to withstand high temperature and pressure and, as usual, cheap.

Other important factors in EOR

Other factors that are needed to be considered in EOR are many. For example, in Saudi Arabia, Iran and Iraq, the reservoirs can be 1000 ft thick of clean sand with high permeability while Malaysian reservoirs are usually in the 30 to 80 feet thick, often containing shale, and permeabilities usually ranging from 20-100 mD. Since a major aim of EOR is to improve sweep the presence of shale or other barriers such as faults posed a problem. Dulang field [8] for example is split up into many compartments; therefore, any injection strategy must address the issue. The presence of aquifer increases drive but it may also cause water to flood wells prematurely. The advantage of Malaysian crudes is the low viscosity which is usually less than one centipoise at reservoir condition. Most oils are sweet without corrosive sulphur or sulphur compounds. [9] Many oil reservoirs in Sudan and Venezuela are heavy oil with viscosities in 500-1000 cP or higher.

to swell. Some reservoirs may have a high percentage of heavy alkanes (paraffin-based oil) or asphalts (asphalt- based oil). Injected fluids must not cause precipitation that will block flow paths. Malaysian reservoirs are all offshore except for one and questions concerning size of platform, location and space for additional facilities such as pumps and compressors are important since large volumes of injected fluids require large pumping and compressing machines. The oil produced may also consist of a high percentage of emulsion of crude oil water and chemicals injected, consequently, demulsifiers are needed. Past and current research papers available in the E-library of the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) can be accessed via the online database of IRC. Elibrary contains peer reviewed published papers, papers from proceedings and any paper submitted to SPE.

Research areas
Investigations into improving sweep and reducing surface tension have been reported since the 70s but as usual more problems are encountered in trying to solve an existing problem, resulting in EOR research to span a wide range of problem solving. For example, use of polymer started as a step to improve sweep, but since reservoirs have high pressures and temperatures and contain brine, research then focused on formulation of polymers that can withstand high pressure, temperature and salinity. Often a polymer does not satisfy all requirements such as xanthan can withstand high pressure and temperature, salinity and shear degradation, but it is prone to biodegradation. Polyacrylamides, on the other hand, do not biodegrade but are degraded by high shearing which occurs at high velocity. Reservoirs also cover large areas in the order of hundreds of acres. As such, reservoirs are heterogeneous because rock properties differ from one point to another. Depending on the deposition history, the differences may be significant with large variations in permeability, porosity and presence of fractures, faults and

Flow behaviour
Unlike geologists who deal with types of rocks, reservoir structure, deposition and other similar disciplines, petroleum engineers (especially reservoir engineers) deal mostly with the fluids. However, some aspects of geology are important in oil and gas production. Since reservoirs are porous media, two other properties are important, namely porosity and permeability. Permeability studies are a well established area but with more complex multiphase flow in EOR, research in subsurface flow has to deal with more complex systems.

Operational considerations
Sea water is usually used in water injection for offshore reservoirs. If surfactants are added to the injection water, then the type of surfactants used must be resistant to high pressure and temperature and salinity. Fresh water can be considered but for reservoirs containing clay, fresh water may cause the clay

shale beds. Heterogeneity makes it difficult to model and also to improve sweep. Reports on gas flooding such as CO2, hydrocarbon gas and flue gas are substantial in literature. In 2005, the oil production by CO2EOR came to 237,000 BPD in the US. [10] While many problems of waterflooding are not overcome by gas flooding, the environmental effects of these gases are of great concern in many instances. As at January 2001, Malaysia's gas reserves stood at 97.6 trillion cubic feet (tcf)[11]. Carbon dioxide that is present in several major gas fields may be used for injection. Reinjection of dissolved gas produced from oil production is necessary in countries where flaring is not allowed and transportation of gas to the markets is not possible. Flue gases are hot and therefore for high viscosity oil, the reduction in viscosity is an advantage which water does not have. One of the ways to improve displacement efficiencies is to use more than one injection fluid such as water alternating gas (WAG). As the name suggests, a slug of water is injected followed by a slug of gas and the two slugs are then pushed by water. Although many field studies on WAG have given positive results, some reservoirs are not suitable for WAG. [12] Variations of injection methods were investigated e.g. water and gas are injected simultaneously or variations of the liquid phase and the gas phase give rise to other WAG methods, sometimes referred to as hybrid WAG or modified WAG. Water may be replaced by foam and the gas may be air, nitrogen, natural gas or CO2. The oil industry spans a range of activities that require expertise and knowledge in many disciplines. Research related to EOR is similarly diverse and, very often, challenging. Apart from improving sweep and reducing surface tension, other keys areas that are being and need to be investigated are: 1) prediction of recovery Before a process can be implemented, it has to be modelled in order to predict the amount

of oil recovered. Simulation and modelling of reservoirs under EOR process is a highly investigated area. It is related to high speed computing, rock and fluid properties studies, economic studies and software development. 2) mechanisms of displacement In order to formulate a chemical and design a suitable process, studies are necessary to find the mechanisms of fluid flow through porous media at high pressure and temperature and how the injected fluid displaces fluid in the pores at micro-scale. Knowing the mechanisms will also assist in predicting recovery. 3) tracing displacement The position of the displacement front when fluid is injected into the reservoir is essential to estimate sweep and to ensure that fluid is not flowing into areas that do not have oil. Radioactive tracers are usually used for monitoring displacement front. Development of better and more accurate tracers is being pursued by many companies, such as using nanofluid. 4) equipment design and optimisation Almost all of Malaysian reservoirs are offshore and any EOR projects must be designed for offshore environment. Consideration of platform space, size and cost will affect the economic viability of the project. Meters, sensors, compressors, pumps and other equipment have to be redesigned for multiphase fluids which are commonly found in EOR processes. 5) injectivity and water quality Fluids may cause clogging of the pores after some years of injection. Some chemicals may be corrosive and in the case of tracers, it may be radioactive. Injection water has to be treated if salt in sea water is too concentrated. Surfactant may not perform with high salinity water. In other words, Injection fluid is an area of research by itself. 6) Oilfield chemicals

While EOR improves recovery, the addition of chemicals can cause formation of emulsion near the wellbore areas. Methods to break up emulsion cheaply and effectively to recover produced oil are a potential research area. Injected chemicals may also be more corrosive and anticorrosion chemicals will be needed. The problem of excessive water production can be dealt with the addition of water control chemicals. A challenge will be to produce nontoxic multifunctional chemicals.

seldom been accurate. The USD100+ per barrel price today hopefully will be a lesson to the oil industry to continue R&D spending even when oil price is low. Given the increasing consumption in Asia, new commercially viable reservoirs are needed to support the growing demand. Saleri [13] estimated that 50 years of the world's need can be sustained by a 10% increase in recovery. Even though renewable biofuels are gaining popularity, its production is not without problems. With today's EOR technologies, recovery is still at most 50%. New and more effective EOR technologies are needed to extract the remaining oil. The industry in general has taken up the challenge with reports on groundbreaking application of advanced telemetry and ultrasonic [14-15].

Trends in EOR research

Investigations on EOR have always been in tandem with the price of oil as illustrated by the frenetic pace in the seventies in the aftermath of oil embargoes. When the price of oil shot up from USD 1-2 per barrel in the sixties to USD40 in the early eighties, oil companies began to invest seriously in EOR. But when the price dropped down to below USD20 for much of the eighties and nineties, R&D in EOR dropped especially profit-oriented international oil companies. EOR became important as tax breaks for companies operating in the USA. Nevertheless, national oil companies such as the Chinese and Norwegian oil companies continued to report EOR investigations. While guesses on the movement of oil prices are reported regularly, long term forecasts have

Conclusions
The main concerns in EOR are to reduce surface tension and increase sweep. However, many other problems exist and a wide range of expertise from other science and engineering discipline is needed. R&D in improving recovery is no longer a side effect of high oil price but an absolute necessity to fuel the world's energy needs.

References
[1] History of oil region http://www.oilheritage.com/history/history.ht m [2] Historical Gold Prices/Price 1800-2008 http://www.finfacts.ie/Private/curency/goldma rketprice.htm [3] T.M. Okasha, J.J. Funk, and H.N. Al-Rashidi, Fifty Years of Wettability Measurements in the Arab-D Carbonate Reservoir, SPE Middle East Oil and Gas Show and Conference, Kingdom of Bahrain, 11-14 March 2007 [4] L.P. Dake , The practice of reservoir engineering (revised edition) Elsevier, Amsterdam,2001 [5] B. C. Craft, M. Hawkins, and Ronald E. Terry, Applied Petroleum Reservoir Engineering (2nd Edition), Prentice-Hall, New York, 1991 [6] H.K. Van Poollen, Fundamentals of enhanced oil recovery , PennWell, Tulsa, 1980 [7] L. Marcel Enhanced oil recovery, Technip, Paris, 1980 [8] Mohamed Zaini B. Md Noor, Kasim B. Selamat, Abdullah B. Kasim, ,Sharifudin Salahudin, Revitalizing a Mature Sand-Prone

Field by Installing Enhanced Gravel-Pack Completions - A Case Study, SPE European Formation Damage Conference, The Hague, Netherlands, 13-14 May 2003 [9] M.I. Omar and A.C. Todd, Development of New Modified Black Oil Correlations for Malaysian Crudes, SPE Asia Pacific Oil and Gas Conference, Singapore, 8-10 February 1993 [10] Oil and gas Journal, Vl 105.15, April 17 2006 p.40. [11] GasMalaysia website, http://www.gasmalaysia.com/about_gas/natur al_gas_in_malaysia.asp [12] R. Henson, A. Todd, P. Corbett, Geologically Based Screening Criteria for Improved Oil Recovery, SPE/DOE Improved Oil Recovery Symposium, 13-17 April 2002, Tulsa, Oklahoma 2002. [13]N.G. Saleri , The next trillion: anticipating and enabling game-changing recoveries, Technology Tomorrow, JPT , April 2006,58:4 [14] SPE Updates Home, Cableless Telemetry System achieves world first in reservoir monitoring, November 1, 2006 in Reservoir (RDD) [14] [15] SPE Updates Home, Oil-in-water monitoring gets ultrasonic boost, December 5, 2006 in HSE, Production (PO)

To platform

Sea bed impermeable rocks gas cap expands down new levels depth water level moves up to replace oil gas zone ( gas cap) Oil zone (formation) water zone (aquifer)

impermeable rocks

Figure 1: A Schematic of a Reservoir with Gas Cap and Aquifer

injection well production well swept zone unswept zone

Figure 2:

Waterflooded Reservoir, Five- spot pattern