Evaluation of Microcrystalline Cellulose as Viscosifier Agent in Water-Based Drilling Fluids

Developing an efficient flow for drilling fluid is important in drilling operations. For this purpose, a lot of organic and inorganic additive agents are used to regulate for flow properties in wellbore. However, cheaply, eco-friendly and efficiently agents are desired in well planning. Thus, new agents have been researching and developing in recent studies. In this study, a new viscosifier agent, which is microcrystalline cellulose (MCC), was evaluated for water-based drilling fluids (WBDFs). Characterizations were determined by X-ray diffraction (XRD) flourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) methods and digital microscopy (DM) images. In the experiments, WBDFs were prepared by using different ratios of MCC. Rheology tests were performed by Apparent viscosity (AV), plastic viscosity (PV), yield point (YP) measurements. Thixotropy calculations (STI and TI) and filtration measurements were made. According to results of MCC added samples, maximum AV, PV and YP were measured as 43 cP, 16 cP and 54 lb/100ft2, respectively. The best STI and TI values were calculated as 0.1 and 0.915. Minimum filtrate was obtained as 11.9 ml. Results showed that MCC is effective viscosifier agent on WBDFs.