Experimental study of polymer injection enhanced oil recovery in homogeneous and heterogeneous porous media using glass-type micromodels

In water flooding process, volumetric sweep efficiency and oil recovery can be enhanced using polymer to increase the viscosity of water. As a result, polymer flooding has higher recovery as compared to water flooding due to front stability and reduction of fingering problem. In this research work, a set of polymer flooding runs were carried out using glass-type micromodels. The micromodels were fabricated to have homogeneous and heterogeneous flow patterns. They were positioned horizontally and saturated with a heavy crude oil sample taken from an Iranian oil field before starting the injection. Three commercial polymers were used in this study. Whole process was photographed continuously with a high-resolution camera to monitor the displacement of polymer solution in the micromodels. As a part of this study, the effect of different parameters including polymer solution concentration, injection flow rate and heterogeneity on performance of polymer flooding was investigated. On top of the regular homogeneous and heterogeneous flow patterns used in this study, a heterogeneous flow pattern mimicking sandstone reservoirs was created based on the image of a thin section of a sandstone (outcrop) and polymer front movement was observed during injection. © 2018 The Author(s)