With the ever-growing demand for more efficient dehydration and desalting of crude oil, classic demulsifiers no longer perform satisfactorily in most cases, and new chemical systems are required. This paper describes new emulsion breakers, generally polyester amines, and gives detailed laboratory studies of their advantages over classic demulsifiers: more complete migration to the interface, improved emulsion breaking and coalescence, improved effluent water quality, and partial corrosion inhibition. These new demulsifiers combined with classic emulsion breakers have been successfully tested.

Keywords:
engineering, production chemistry, concentration, fluid compatibility, demulsifier chemistry, polyesteramine, oilfield chemistry, crude oil, chemical treatment, interface
Subjects:
Downhole chemical treatments and fluid compatibility, Processing Systems and Design, Production Chemistry, Metallurgy and Biology, Separation and treating
Copyright 1991, Society of Petroleum Engineers
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