Investigation of Combined Polymer Flooding and Low Salinity Water for Enhanced Oil Recovery in Dolomite Reservoir using Okro (Abelmoschus esculentus)

The major objective of the present investigation was to study combined polymer flooding with low salinity water for enhanced oil recovery in dolomite reservoirs using okro (Abelmoschus esculentus)with the formulation of saline water and synthetic sea water, to design the core flooding set up and to conduct displacement experiments on six (6) dolomite core samples as well as studying the effect of concentration of Okropolymer, HPAM and saline water on oil recovery.When a reservoir is flooded with polymer, the mobility ratio between the displaced fluid and the displacing fluid become favourable compared to the conventional water flooding. In the oil and gas industry, the synthetic polymer polyacrylamide in hydrolysed form and the biopolymer xanthan are being used for this purpose. However, the polyacrylamide is vulnerable to high temperature and salinity. Also, its synthetic nature makes it harmful to the environment. The biopolymer xanthan has the problem of degradation and both are very expensive. With the shortfall in crude oil price coupled with the high cost of exploitation and drilling new wells, there is need to look inward and think out of the box in formulating new improved polymers that can battle these problems. Natural polymers from agricultural and forest produce are rampant in nature, cheap and environmentally friendly. These agricultural and forest produce contain starch and cellulose which are known to have rigid and long polysaccharide chains that can withstand the rough reservoir conditions. This study, therefore, investigate the use of Abelmoschusesculentus (Okro) as a natural polymer that can be used for enhanced oil recovery applications. It was observed that this polymer exhibits non-Newtonian, pseudoplastic and shear-thinning behaviours. Various experiments conducted in this research indicate that natural polymers can recover additional oil from an oil field