Wettability effect on oil recovery using rock-structured microfluidics.

Surface wettability has a crucial impact on drop splashing, emulsion dynamics, slip flow for drag reduction, fluid-fluid displacement, and various microfluidic applications. Targeting enhanced oil recovery (EOR) applications, we experimentally investigate the effect of matrix wettability on the invasion morphology and sweep efficiency of viscous oil displaced by different aqueous floods using microfluidics, whose porous network mimics a sandstone structure. For comparison, systematic experiments of the same oil-flood pair are done in both hydrophilic and hydrophobic microfluidic chips.

A microfluidic study of oil displacement in porous media at elevated temperature and pressure.

Microfluidics methods offer possibilities for visual observations of oil recovery processes. Good control over test parameters also provides the opportunity to conduct tests that simulate representative reservoir conditions. This paper presents a setup and procedure development for microfluidic oil recovery tests at elevated temperature and pressure.

Lignosulfonates in Crude Oil Processing: Interactions with Asphaltenes at the Oil/Water Interface and Screening of Potential Applications.

The goal of this article is to test the potential application of lignosulfonates (LSs) in crude oil production and processing. Three LS samples of varying hydrophobicity and average molecular weight were considered. First, the interfacial tension between brine and xylene and interfacial dilational rheology properties of LS samples were measured.

Development of a Microfluidic Method to Study Enhanced Oil Recovery by Low Salinity Water Flooding.

Microfluidics is an appealing method to study processes at rock pore scale such as oil recovery because of the similar size range. It also offers several advantages over the conventional core flooding methodology, for example, easy cleaning and reuse of the same porous network chips or the option to visually track the process. In this study, the effects of injection rate, flood volume, micromodel structure, initial brine saturation, aging, oil type, brine concentration, and composition are systematically investigated.