WATER INJECTION, POLYMER INJECTION AND POLYMER ALTERNATING WATER INJECTION FOR ENHANCED OIL RECOVERY - A LABORATORY STUDY

摘要

Developing an efficient methodology for oil recovery is extremely important in this commodity industry, which may indeed lead to wide spread profitability. In the conventional water injection method, oil displacement occurs by mechanical behavior between fluids. Nevertheless, depending on mobility ratio, a huge quantity of injected water is necessary. Polymer injection aims to increase water viscosity and improve the water/oil mobility ratio, thus improving sweep efficiency. The alternating banks of polymer and water injection appear as an option for the suitable fields. By doing so, the bank serves as an economic alternative, as injecting polymer solution is an expensive process. The main objective of this study is to analyze and comparison of the efficiency of water injection, polymer injection and polymer alternate water injection. For this purpose, tests were carried out offset in core samples of sandstones using paraffin oil, saline solution and polymer and were obtained the recovery factor and water-oil ratio for each method. The obtained results for the continuous polymer injection and alternating polymer and water injection were promising in relation to the conventional water injection, aiming to anticipate the oil production and to improve the water management with the reduction of injected and produced water volumes.