Loading...

Microscopic insight into kinetics of inorganic scale deposition during smart water injection using dynamic quartz crystal microbalance and molecular dynamics simulation

Mirzaalian Dastjerdi, A ; Sharif University of Technology | 2020

725 Viewed
  1. Type of Document: Article
  2. DOI: 10.1021/acs.iecr.9b05236
  3. Publisher: American Chemical Society , 2020
  4. Abstract:
  5. Inorganic scale deposition has been found to affect many industrial processes, including water injection into the oil reservoirs. The incompatibility of high sulfate ion content of seawater with formation water containing calcium ions results in formation damage and production decline. In this study, several simultaneous techniques are utilized for qualitative and quantitative analyses of calcium sulfate scale to get more insight into the formation damage during smart water flooding at micro and nanoscales. In the experimental section, calcium sulfate deposition due to the mixing of the formation water and seawater samples was investigated using the dynamic quartz crystal microbalance technique. The effect of sulfate and magnesium ions existing in the seawater on the amount of calcium sulfate deposition was studied, individually. The results showed that the sulfate concentration of seawater could significantly change the mass deposition in a specific range. Also, at an optimal concentration of the magnesium ions, the total amount of calcium sulfate deposition decreased by 60 percent. However, magnesium ions could decrease the time of the initial stage of deposition significantly. The results revealed the amount of deposition and the time of initial stage beyond 5 times dilution of seawater are not noticeable. In addition, the linear slope of the second stage of deposition for the mixture of formation water and 5-fold diluted seawater decreased by 92 percent compared to the original seawater. To verify the results for the magnesium effect, the molecular dynamics simulation method was used to compare the simulation results with the experimental data. Likewise, the results obtained from the simulation model showed that at an optimal concentration of the magnesium ions in the seawater, the amount of calcium sulfate deposition was noticeably decreased. Copyright © 2019 American Chemical Society
  6. Keywords:
  7. Driers (materials) ; Metal ions ; Molecular dynamics ; Petroleum reservoir engineering ; Petroleum reservoirs ; Produced Water ; Quartz ; Quartz crystal microbalances ; Scale (deposits) ; Seawater effects ; Sulfur compounds ; Inorganic scale deposition ; Molecular dynamics simulation methods ; Molecular dynamics simulations ; Optimal concentration ; Qualitative and quantitative analysis ; Quartz crystal microbalance techniques ; Sulfate concentrations ; Sulfate-ion contents ; Calcium compounds
  8. Source: Industrial and Engineering Chemistry Research ; Volume 59, Issue 2 , 2020 , Pages 609-619
  9. URL: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.iecr.9b05236