Rheological Assessment of VES as an EOR Fluid in Carbonate Reservoir Available to Purchase

Mobility control is the most important phenomenon that contributes to the volumetric sweep efficiency in enhanced oil recovery processes. Polymers have been used by the industry to provide the required viscosity to the injection fluids. However, applicability of polymers has its limitation. Most of the polymers easily degrade under harsh reservoir conditions. In this work, we investigated the rheological aspect of viscoelastic surfactant (VES) as an alternative to the polymer in chemical EOR processes. VES self assembles at favorable conditions to form wormlike micelles whose length can vary significantly. The conditions ascertained in this work are concentration, shear rate, temperature, time; salinity etc. In addition, the efficiency of VES with the polymer at various conditions was compared. Results indicated that VES can generate higher viscosity at the extreme conditions of reservoirs. This might be beneficial for EOR point of view. Also, the comparative studies confirm the potential of VES over polymer as an EOR fluid.