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Investigation of Asphaltene Electro-deposition In Presence of Addetives

Moradpour, Nikoo | 2017

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  1. Type of Document: M.Sc. Thesis
  2. Language: Farsi
  3. Document No: 50977 (06)
  4. University: Sharif University of Technology
  5. Department: Chemical and Petroleum Engineering
  6. Advisor(s): Ayatollahi, Shahabodin; Dehghani, Farzaneh
  7. Abstract:
  8. Given the decreasing trend of light petroleum reserves and the necessity to produce heavy and extra-heavy oil resources, the challenge of dealing with existing asphaltene related problems, which is the heaviest and the most complex component of crude oil, has become increasingly tangible. Asphaltene precipitates and deposits due to pressure, temperature or composition alterations which leads to obstruction of porous media and production facilities. Set the costly methods aside, one of the available approaches to prevent asphaltene precipitation, is to apply an electric field upon the suspected zone, which is cheap and uncomplicated. Besides, utilizing nano-particles while applying electric field, can provide us with different mechanisms and actually different approaches to prevent asphaltene precipitation or directing the depositions toward a desirable site. In this study, the effect of electrical potential on the asphaltene deposition phenomenon in the presence of additives has been investigated.According to the complexity of the structure and performance of various asphaltenic oils, first, the optimum conditions for the instability of heavy components of the specified crude oil for the present work were found. To do so, the most common method, is to add normal alkanes which is time-consuming and extracts low asphaltene amounts if the oil is of low asphaltene content originally. Therefore, in this study, it was discovered that a 1:1 solution of acetone and normal heptane with a ratio of 35:1 regarding crude oil content, gives us the most amount of deposition on negative electrode; which demonstrates positive charge for asphaltene particles. Acetone magnifies the amount of deposition on cathode by providing a stronger electric field and directing more particles toward the electrode. As this method is able to precipitate and reach a high amount of deposition, it can be considered as a way to estimate the asphaltene content of any crude oil. Also, the effect of time and field intensity on deposition were investigated.Lastly, commercial (SiO2, TiO2 and Al2O3) and synthetic nano-particles (CeNiO, CeZrO3 and CeCaO), as well as surfactants (SLES and LABS) were analyzed and the results were as follows: Commercial nano-particles initially increased and changed the amount and charge of the depositions; after coating the whole area of anode by nano-particles, no asphaltene deposition was observed on the electrode. Regarding synthetic nano-particles, the react identical to the way surfactants do, but more efficiently. The trend of asphaltene deposition is descending and by reaching a specific concentration for each type, no precipitation happens in the mixture
  9. Keywords:
  10. Asphaltene Deposition ; Electric Potential ; Synthetic ; Nanoparticles ; Surfactants ; Optimized Solution ; Asphaltene Particles Stability

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