Evaluation of the potential of smart water-flooding to enhance oil

Client

The Petroleum Institute

Project Description

The primary objectives of the project are to study the possible use of smart water flooding in ASAB oil reservoir, provide ADCO with optimum water flooding strategy, and to enrich the literature with additional information on the mechanics of smart water flooding process. Smart water flooding refers to optimizing oil recovery by tuning the injection water properties such as salinity and ionic composition, whereas it is believed this would change the wettability to more water wet. This would affect the displacement efficiency, which is one of the critical parameters that controls the success of any miscible or immiscible flooding project. There are little references in the literature that cover the optimization of smart water flooding process in carbonate formations, and this study seeks to cover this gap with particular application to the target UAE reservoir. The project is currently being conducted jointly with the EOR research team from Khalifa University.