Experimental Investigation of Low Salinity Hot Water Injection to Enhance the Recovery of Heavy Oil Reservoirs

Abstract

Abstract Many laboratory core flood investigations have shown increased oil recovery is achieved by water flooding applying low salinity water, compared with injection of high salinity produced water or brine seawater. This work describes a sand pack flood test, designed to identify whether this process could be observed as additional mechanism to thermal drive mechanism as a new technique for heavy oil displacement. The core and sand pack flood test was schematically designed and conducted, to ensure that the results achieved concerning the salinity alteration under stabilized thermal displacement conditions, The result confirms a significant increase in oil recovery due to hot water low salinity injection. In all experiments done, approve the effect of low salinity as an additional to thermal recovery mechanism of heavy crude oil when applied to the residual oil after high salinity hot water flood. It would indicate that more than 25 percent additional oil would be recovered by low salinity as additional mechanism to hot water flooding. The studies have been conducted mainly for heavy oil from BAW Sudan oil field, under current reservoir conditions. Detailed benefits regarding to this technique is presented concerning to enhance oil recovery in BAW oil field.