TY - JOUR

T1 - Slightly hydrophobic silica nanoparticles for enhanced oil recovery

T2 - Interfacial and rheological behaviour

AU - Zargartalebi, Mohammad

AU - Kharrat, Riyaz

AU - Barati, Nasim

AU - Zargartalebi, Ali

PY - 2013

Y1 - 2013

N2 - This paper is aimed at studying AEROSIL® R816 nanoparticle behaviour to see if it has enough feasibility to be used as a chemical agent in enhanced oil recovery (EOR) processes. The main focus is on interfacial and rheological behaviour of this particle in aqueous and polymeric media. Interfacial tension measurements between aqueous nanoparticle suspensions and oil showed that AEROSIL® R816 particles were able to reduce the interfacial tension between water and oil to half of its original value. This property led to development of stabilised oil in water emulsions. Moreover, viscosity measurements showed that AEROSIL® R816 had a great ability in rheology modification of aqueous solutions. The solution viscosity was studied as a function of nanoparticle concentration and shear rate. It was seen that viscosity rose as the nanoparticle concentration was increased. From the standpoint of shear dependency, two regions of shear thinning behaviour were observed for different shear rate regions. Finally, by dissolving a fixed amount of a low molecular weight polyacrylamide into nanoparticle suspensions of different concentrations, the stability of R816 suspensions was significantly improved. This addition also resulted in almost considerable enhancement of nanoparticle thickening property.

AB - This paper is aimed at studying AEROSIL® R816 nanoparticle behaviour to see if it has enough feasibility to be used as a chemical agent in enhanced oil recovery (EOR) processes. The main focus is on interfacial and rheological behaviour of this particle in aqueous and polymeric media. Interfacial tension measurements between aqueous nanoparticle suspensions and oil showed that AEROSIL® R816 particles were able to reduce the interfacial tension between water and oil to half of its original value. This property led to development of stabilised oil in water emulsions. Moreover, viscosity measurements showed that AEROSIL® R816 had a great ability in rheology modification of aqueous solutions. The solution viscosity was studied as a function of nanoparticle concentration and shear rate. It was seen that viscosity rose as the nanoparticle concentration was increased. From the standpoint of shear dependency, two regions of shear thinning behaviour were observed for different shear rate regions. Finally, by dissolving a fixed amount of a low molecular weight polyacrylamide into nanoparticle suspensions of different concentrations, the stability of R816 suspensions was significantly improved. This addition also resulted in almost considerable enhancement of nanoparticle thickening property.

KW - Hydrophobic silica nanoparticle

KW - Interfacial tension

KW - Polyacrylamide

KW - Rheological behaviour

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84879587848&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1504/IJOGCT.2013.054866

DO - 10.1504/IJOGCT.2013.054866

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:84879587848

VL - 6.2013

SP - 408

EP - 421

JO - International Journal of Oil, Gas and Coal Technology

JF - International Journal of Oil, Gas and Coal Technology

SN - 1753-3317

IS - 4

ER -