Reviving heavy-oil reservoirs with foam and steam

Journal Article · Tue Feb 02 04:00:00 EST 1982 · Oil Gas J.; (United States)

OSTI ID:5592329

Doscher, T M; Kuuskraa, V A

The efficiency of many enhanced oil recovery technologies appears to be affected by the gravity segregation of the injected and displaced reservoir fluids. This is particularly true for steam drive and carbon dioxide injection for the recovery of oil. Since steam and carbon dioxide are generally less dense than the reservoir fluids, they preferentially gravitate to the top of the permeable reservoir layer. One major way to increase the efficiency of steam drive should be to plug the stratified steam zone at the top (or in a high permeability streak) of a reservoir. This would reduce the cross-sectional area of the steam channel and help maintain a more favorable ratio between oil produced and steam injected. The CLD Group, Inc. has developed a foam block system that would be effective in steam drive operations. Bench scale studies of the revised foam block system (an air-steam-foaming agent system) were first made in laboratory cores and later tested in 16-ft long sand packs at the temperatures and pressures of known steam drive operations.

• OSTI ID: 5592329
• Journal Information: Oil Gas J.; (United States), Journal Name: Oil Gas J.; (United States) Vol. 80:5; ISSN OIGJA
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

02 PETROLEUM
020300* -- Petroleum-- Drilling & Production
BENCH-SCALE EXPERIMENTS
COLLOIDS
CONTROL
DISPERSIONS
ENERGY SOURCES
ENHANCED RECOVERY
FLUID INJECTION
FOAMS
FOSSIL FUELS
FUELS
OIL WELLS
PERMEABILITY
PETROLEUM
PLUGGING
PROCESS CONTROL
RECOVERY
STEAM INJECTION
VISCOSITY
WELLS