Impact of enhance oil recovery using polymer flooding for alpha-x oilfield in Niger Delta

Abstract

Nigeria being the 12th producer of crude oil globally has neglected the use of enhance oil recovery methods especially in medium to small oil fields. In this research the impact of enhanced oil recovery is provided in Alpha-x oilfield located in Niger Delta. Polymer flooding which is a chemical method of enhanced oil recovery that works by increasing viscosity of injected water to improve sweep efficiency was simulated using Schlumberger Eclipse 100 simulator. A Niger Delta well with a weak aquifer was mimicked using Fetkovich method and modelled using a grid block with 20x15x5 XYZ, with an injection well placed at cell (1,11,1) and a producer at cell (20,1,1). Three cases were run which were the production on natural drive (primary recovery), production with water injection (secondary recovery) and oil production with polymer flooding (Enhanced oil recovery), each case was ran for 38 years. After successfully running the simulation and at an oil production rate of 2000 bbl/day: the natural drive had a recovery factor of 17.07% with 8.05 MMSTB of oil; the water injection has a recovery factor of 34% with 12.15 MMSTB; and the polymer flooding at an injection rate of 3000 stb/day and concentration of 0.525 has 38% recovery factor with 13.38 MMSTB. This indicates that with injection of polymer an increment of 4% recovery factor and 1.23 MMSTB of oil produced.