Estimation of IFT reduction by a biomass material and potential of its utilization for EOR

Surfactant injection is one of the most effective EOR techniques. Chemical surfactants however pose a few problems such as their high cost and low-degradability. We study on the utilization of biomass such as agricultural fertilizer mainly comprising the residue of squeezed beer yeast for EOR as an alternative of chemical surfactants because crude oil can be completely miscible with the fertilizer solution. The fertilizer can be stably supplied at a low cost because it is a waste of beer brewing industry and is only used for an animal feed additive so far. Its retail price is approximately 1 USD/kg in Japan. We semi-quantitatively estimated the interfacial tension (IFT) between the fertilizer solution and crude oil by the oil displacement test. Concentration of the fertilizer was varied between 10 to 50 g/L. The fertilizer solution to which sodium chloride was added at a concentration of 10 to 40 g/L was hydrothermally treated at 60, 80, 100 or 120°C for 10, 20, 30, 45 or 60 minutes respectively before the tests. The fertilizer solution to which crude oil was added at a ratio of 1 % was also hydrothermally treated at 120°C for 20 minutes. Solution of surfactin which was a commercial biosurfactant was used as a standard of the IFT. The IFT was reduced with the decrease in salinity and increase in concentration of the fertilizer and temperature of the hydrothermal treatment. Time of the hydrothermal treatment was preferably 30 minutes or less for the IFT reduction. The capability of 50 g/L of fertilizer solution to reduce the IFT was almost same as the capability of 0.2 g/L of the surfactin solution. Because the fertilizer solution comes into contact with residual oil under high temperature in oil reservoir, IFT between the solution and crude oil can be expected to be reduced in-situ. Core flooding experiments were carried out by injecting the fertilizer solution after the water flooding as the primary oil recovery. 1.2 % of original oil in place was additionally recovered by injecting 50 g/L of the fertilizer solution after the water flooding. The fertilizer should be biodegradable because it is a microbially-derived substance. In addition, because the IFT reduction was observed after the hydrothermal treatment of the fertilizer solution, the fertilizer should be effective even in the reservoir whose temperature is high such as 120°C at which chemical surfactants may be deactivated. From those results, the injection of the fertilizer solution can be a promising EOR which has both high cost performance, low environmental load and high versatility.