Injection fluids

In the pre-development stage, core samples can be used to test the compatibility of injection fluids with the formation, to predict borehole stability under various drilling conditions and to establish the probability of formation failure and sand production. 

The expansion of the reservoir fluids, which is a function of their volume and compressibility, act as a source of drive energy which can act to support primary producf/on from the reservoir. Primary production means using the natural energy stored in the reservoir as a drive mechanism for production. Secondary recovery would imply adding some energy to the reservoir by injecting fluids such as water or gas, to help to support the reservoir pressure as production takes place. 

There are two principal mechanisms of enhanced oil recovery increasing volumetric sweep efficiency of the injected fluid and increasing oil displacement efficiency by the injected fluid. In both, chemicals are used to modify the properties of an injected fluid whether water, steam, a miscible gas such as CO2 or natural gas, or an immiscible gas, usually nitrogen. Poor reservoir volumetric sweep efficiency is the greatest obstacle to increasing oil recovery (9). 

When water is injected into a water-wet reservoir, oil is displaced ahead of the injected fluid. Injection water preferentially invades the small- and medium-sized flow channels or pores. As the water front passes, unrecovered oil is left in the form of spherical, uncoimected droplets in the center of pores or globules of oil extending through intercoimected rock pores. In both cases, the oil is completely surrounded by water and is immobile. There is htde oil production after injection water breakthrough at the production well (5). 

Polymer Flooding. Even in the absence of fractures and thief 2ones, the volumetric sweep efficiency of injected fluids can be quite low. The poor volumetric sweep efficiency exhibited in waterfloods is related to the mobiUty ratio, Af, the mobiUty of the injected water in the highly flooded (low oil saturation) rock, divided by the mobiUty of the oil in oil-bearing portions of the reservoir, (72,73). The mobiUty ratio is related to the rock permeabihty to oil, and injected water, and to the viscosity of these fluids by the following equation ... 

Surfactants evaluated in surfactant-enhanced alkaline flooding include internal olefin sulfonates (259,261), linear alkyl xylene sulfonates (262), petroleum sulfonates (262), alcohol ethoxysulfates (258,261,263), and alcohol ethoxylates/anionic surfactants (257). Water-thickening polymers, either xanthan or polyacrylamide, can reduce injected fluid mobiHty in alkaline flooding (264) and surfactant-enhanced alkaline flooding (259,263). The combined use of alkah, surfactant, and water-thickening polymer has been termed the alkaH—surfactant—polymer (ASP) process. Cross-linked polymers have been used to increase volumetric sweep efficiency of surfactant—polymer—alkaline agent formulations (265). 

Another contributing mechanism is the direct cooling of hot propellant surface by contact with the injected fluid. The fluid should cause the decomposing surface to reduce its pyrolysis rate to a point where combustion cannot be sustained. In addition, the presence of water on the surface would obstruct heat transfer from the gas-phase reaction zones to the solid surface, thus augmenting the cooling of the surface. Proponents of these two approaches have correlated the injection data on the basis of mass of fluid required per unit area of surface, but theoretical justifications for the use of this particular correlating parameter have not been presented. 

A third approach has been suggested by Jaroudi (Jl), who points out that one necessary condition to prevent reignition of the propellant is to ensure that the gas temperature resulting from thermal equilibrium between the injected fluid and the combustion products is below the propellant autoignition temperature. This approach leads to the conclusion that the ratio of coolant mass flow to propellant mass flow is the critical correlating parameter. 

In an effort to rationalize the basic mechanism, Brown and Jensen (B12) have solved the dynamic energy- and mass-flow equations, allowing for a finite rate of vaporization of the injected fluid. The results of these calculations have shown that both mechanisms can be important. For propellants which require relatively low depressurization rates (such as polyurethane types), the evaporative-cooling mechanism can develop sufficient depressurization rates. For PBAN propellants, direct surface-cooling is the only mechanism whereby estinguishment can be accomplished. 

Typing correction fluid Fuel-injection fluid Balloons... 

Enhanced oil-recovery processes include chemical and gas floods, steam, combustion, and electric heating. Gas floods, including immiscible and miscible processes, are usually defined by injected fluids (carbon dioxide, flue gas, nitrogen, or hydrocarbon). Steam projects involve cyclic steam (huff and puff) or steam drive. Combustion technologies can be subdivided into those that autoignite and those that require a heat source at injectors [521]. 

The addition of tracer chemicals to an injection fluid provides information on the permeability of a reservoir. Small amounts of a tracer are added to the injected fluid and the distribution of the tracer at the production well is monitored with respect to time. Radioactive tracers and nonradioactive tracers... 

In order to mitigate this problem, the subsurface paths of the injected fluids must be known. 

Tracers have been used to label fluids in order to track fluid movement and monitor chemical changes of the injected fluid. Radioactive materials are one class of commonly used tracers. These tracers have several drawbacks. One drawback is that they require special handling because of the danger posed to personnel and the environment. Another drawback is the alteration by the radioactive materials of the natural isotope ratio indigenous to the reservoir— thereby interfering with scientific analysis of the reservoir fluid characteristics. In addition, the half life of radioactive tracers tends to be either too long or too short for practical use. 

Medical MF membranes provide a convenient, reliable means to sterilize fluids without heat. Membranes are used to filter injectable fluids during manufacture. Sometimes they are inserted into the tube leading to a patient s vein. 

Fluid movement conditions are such that the injected fluids will not migrate within 10,000 years vertically upward out of the injection zone or laterally within the injection zone to a point of discharge or interface with an Underground Source of Drinking Water (USDW). 

In extreme situations, incompatibility between injection fluids and reservoir components can be so great that deep-well disposal will not be the most cost-effective approach to waste disposal. In other situations, such remedial measures as pretreatment or controlling fluid concentrations or temperatures can permit injection even when incompatibilities exist. In addition to operational problems, waste-reservoir incompatibility can cause wastes to migrate out of the injection zone (casing/confining-layer failure) and even cause surface-water contamination (well blowout). 

Scaling on injection equipment by precipitation from injection fluid. 

The injected fluids include the effluent from a sugar mill and the waste from the production of furfural, an aldehyde processed from the residues of processed sugar cane. The waste is hot (about 75°C to 93°C), acidic (pH 2.6 to 4.5), and has high concentrations of organics, nitrogen, and phosphorus.173 The waste is not classified as hazardous under 40 CFR 261, and the well is currently regulated by the State of Florida as a nonhazardous injection well. The organic carbon concentration exceeds 5000 mg/L. 

The injection well was cased to a depth of about 1495 m (4900 ft) and extended into dolomite to a total depth of 1617 m (5300 ft). Injection began in the early 1960s and averaged around 340 L/min (90 gal/min). The natural fluid level was 60 m (200 ft) below the wellhead, and wastes were injected using gravity flow that is, the pressure head of the well when filled to the surface with fluid was sufficient to inject fluids without pumping under pressure.181... 

Kaufman, M.I. and McKenzie, D.J., Upward migration of deep-well waste injection fluids in Floridan aquifer, South Florida, J. Res. U. S. Geol. Surv., 3, 261-271, 1975. 

Oil-field chemistry has undergone major changes since the publication of earlier books on this subject Enhanced oil recovery research has shifted from processes in which surfactants and polymers are the primary promoters of increased oil production to processes in which surfactants are additives to improve the incremental oil recovery provided by steam and miscible gas injection fluids. Improved and more cost-effective cross-linked polymer systems have resulted from a better understanding of chemical cross-links in polysaccharides and of the rheological behavior of cross-linked fluids. The thrust of completion and hydraulic fracturing chemical research has shifted somewhat from systems designed for ever deeper, hotter formations to chemicals, particularly polymers, that exhibit improved cost effectiveness at more moderate reservoir conditions. 

Surfactants are used to stabilize water-in-oil emulsions and to promote rapid return of injected fluids and a faster return of the well to hydrocarbon production. Although they are expensive, water-soluble fluorochemicals have been shown to be effective in this application (97,98). 

Matrix acidizing is the injection of acids into the formation at a pressure below the formation parting pressure (the pressure at which natural fractures are forced open by injected fluids). 

Reduced injectivity due to formation damage can be a significant problem in injection wells. Precipitate formation due to ions present in the injection water contacting counterions in formation fluids, solids initially present in the injection fluid (scaling), bacterial corrosion products, and corrosion products from metal surfaces in the injection system can all reduce permeability near the wellbore (153). The consequent reduced injection rate can result in a lower rate of oil production at offset wells. Dealing with corrosion and bacterial problems, compatibility of ions in the injection water and formation fluids, and filtration can all alleviate formation damage. 

The amount of oil recovery promoted by an injected fluid is related to its ability to displace the oil it contacts in the reservoir, termed the oil displacement efficiency (ODE), and to the relative amount of the reservoir invaded by the injected fluid, termed the volumetric sweep efficiency (VSE). Total oil recovery may be expressed as ... 

For example, consider a reservoir which has produced 40% of the oil originally in place. If an injection fluid contacts 70% of the reservoir and has an oil displacement efficiency of 70% of the remaining oil (42% of the oil originally in place) then the maximum enhanced oil recovery is 49% of the oil remaining in place or 29% of the oil originally present in the reservoir. (Trapping and other oil loss mechanisms are neglected in this simplified treatment.) Total oil recovery has increased to 69%. 

Volumetric sweep efficiency is determined by the permeability and wettability distribution in the reservoir and by the properties of injected fluids. Waterflooding characteristically exhibits poor volumetric sweep efficiency. The more expensive the injection fluid, the more important it is to have a high volumetric sweep efficiency so that the injected fluid contacts and thus mobilizes a larger volume of oil. High permeability streaks or layers (thief zones) and natural or induced rock fractures can channel the injected fluid through a small portion of the reservoir resulting in a low volumetric sweep efficiency. 

Both nonionic and anionic surfactants have been evaluated in this application (488,489) including internal olefin sulfonates (487, 490), linear alkylxylene sulfonates (490), petroleum sulfonates (491), alcohol ethoxysulfates (487,489,492). Ethoxylated alcohols have been added to some anionic surfactant formulations to improve interfacial properties (486). The use of water thickening polymers, either xanthan or polyacrylamide to reduce injected fluid mobility mobility has been proposed for both alkaline flooding (493) and surfactant enhanced alkaline flooding (492). Crosslinked polymers have been used to increase volumetric sweep efficiency of surfactant - polymer - alkaline agent formulations (493). 

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