Impact of <i>Imperata Cylindrica</i> on the Performance of Water Based Mud in Saline Medium

Abstract Drilling fluids are the most important factor in drilling operations. It is a standard procedure to essentially improve the properties of these fluid to meet the necessary requirements. Regardless of the advanced research and improvements done, there is still need to deeply focus on the causes of formation damage, stuck pipe and other problems mud engineers encounter while drilling. Hence the application of natural additive. In this experimental study, spear grass was pulverized to fine particles and mixed with bentonite mud to test for the rheological and filtration properties and determine its effect on the mud. A design of experiment was applied using surface methodology for the experimental runs using different mud compositions. The rheological, pH, mud weight and filtration loss control test were conducted for each sample at varying temperatures. The spear grass powder and xanthan gum were measured at 1g and the saltwater concentration varied from 5g –25g which were mixed to formulate different variations of bentonite water based mud at varying temperatures. The analysis showed the influence of salt water on the properties of the mud at different concentrations. The spear grass powder enhanced the properties of the mud by reducing the rate of fluid loss when the mud was contaminated by salt and there was an improvement on other mud properties compared to the conventional additive, Xanthan gum was used. This paper aims to discuss the formulation of water-based mud (WBM) using spear grass (Imperata cylindrica) as an additive for fluid loss control.