Experimental Study On Enhanced Oil Recovery of Heavy Oil using Nanosilica combined with Polymer flooding in a porous medium

It is no news that vital sources of non-renewable energy which are relevant to our daily use and consumption are severely being depleted in Nigeria and the world in general. As such, oil companies are turning to unconventional sources of non-renewable energy such as heavy oil and shale oil. Research also proves that Nigeria is blessed with over 30-40million barrels of heavy oil deposits in the south-Western region which lie unharnessed. Also, as we all evidently know, primary and secondary recovery methods of heavy oil are not sufficient enough to produce these large subsurface deposits of heavy oil and a tertiary/enhanced method is needed to fully and economically produce the oil.These research work seeks to experimentally enhance the recovery of Heavy oil using Nanosilica (which was utilized in the form of silica powder) combined with a polymer flooding process in a porous medium. Major areas of focus include the behavior of the silica powder (nanosilica) on the polymer, the stability of the nanosilica in the reservoir, the effect of its particle sizes on Interfacial tension, and the additional rate of recovery of the nanosilica. In this research work, materials were obtained locally from the market and flooded in a core flooding experimental process, using a core flooding simulator. The results which were presented in a table showed that flooding with the polymer (PAM) resulted in a 21.43% increase in heavy oil recovery, flooding with the nanosilica resulted in a 6.25% increase in heavy oil recovery, while a 9.09% increase in heavy oil recovery was discovered upon flooding with a 50-50 blend of Polyacrylamides and silica powder. Carefully analysis of the results showed that the Polyacrylamides performed best in the core flooding process, rather than enhance the performance of the polyacrylamides, the silica powder inhibited its performance and was not stable in the porous medium. As a recommendation, an appropriate solvent should be found to dissolve the silica powder, or actual nanosilica in nano sizes used