Development of Non Petroleum Base Chemicals for Improving Oil Recovery in Indonesia

Abstract The advantages of oil as primary energy source are still unsurpassed by any other source. After primary and secondary recovery, approximately 50 % to 70 % original oil in-place were left in reservoirs. The oil left is unrecoverable by conventional means. The enhanced oil recovery or tertiary oil recovery indeed is a very promising effort in the future. The goal of this research is to develop chemicals produced from local materials which can be used to optimize recovery and minimize residual oil in the reservoir by: lowering the oil / water interfacial tension and improving mobility ratio. A laboratory experiment had been carried out to simulate the process. The porous media used in the oil displacement process was prepared from stainless steel cylinder and contain fine crushed core. It is proposed to be an artificial reservoir with dimension about 3.75 cm ID x 10.8 cm L. The procedure of operation is as follows: initially the reservoir model was filled with brine until 100 % saturation. Then oil was injected into the medium to represent oil migration until water saturation become minimum (Swc), which is about 30 %. After this, the reservoir was flooded by the same brine until Sor was reached, which is about 10 %. The oil remaining in the reservoir after this water flood was then subjected to various injection of different chemicals for further oil recoveries. The experimental results show that some chemicals developed in the laboratory can be used as EOR chemicals. The oil displacement experiments show that as much as 20 % to 80 % of remaining oil can be recovered by flooding it with the chemicals. The results also show that the oil recovery depends on type of chemicals, chemical concentration, pressure and temperature, type of crude oil and the brine concentration.