Describing viscosity of IOR polymer solutions with differential non-Newtonian fluid models

Abstract

The non-Newtonian viscosity of multiple of polymers was measured. For tests were taken polymers that are widely used in oil industry. They are: HEC; Xanthan gum; Polypack; Flopaam: 5115VHM, 5115VLM, AN 125VHM, AN 125VLM, 3610VHM, 3130S. These polymers were dilute to a number of low concentrations and viscosity for all of them was measured at rheometer with a cone-plate tool. All calculated and measured values are recorded in tables and presented in Experimental section [2]. The graphical analysis was performed for each polymer and trends were identified and compared between different polymers. The regions with “very dilute” concentrations were identified. This helped to find a criterion for “very dilute” solution. Such knowledge is very important due to gives a key to understanding what model can be applied for this particular polymer at this particular concentration. Then data from measurements were tested against the prediction curves of several advanced, physic-based non-Newtonian models. These models are Finitely Extensible Nonlinear Elastic-Peterlin (FENE-P) dumbbell model, which was designed for dilute concentrations and exponential Phan-Thien-Tanner model (PTT), which was designed for concentrated solutions. The ranges of concentrations with a good correlation between data points and model curves were identified for each polymer. Results from different polymers were compared and some similarity in trends identified. The section Conclusions [4] sum up all conclusions that were made after experiments and analysis of model prediction.