Bjørn Kvamme
University of Bergen, Norway
Title: Smart low weight emulsifiers for efficient CoI2 utilization in enhanced oil recovery
Biography
Biography: Bjørn Kvamme
Abstract
Worldwide there are huge amounts of methane trapped in water as hydrate. These ice-like hydrate crystals contains up to 14% methane in a highly concentrated form. Unlike conventional oil and gas, hydrates are spread all over the world in permafrost region or deep offshore sediments. Many countries depend on import of fossil fuel and in many cases on various qualities of contaminating coal. Simple and inexpensive ways to produce these hydrates are available and in this work we demonstrate by state of the art reservoir modeling of some of these production methods. This includes pressure reduction as well as replacement of CH4 hydrate by CO2 hydrate. The latter option is discussed in more details since it represents an interesting concept for CO2 utilization and safe long terms storage of CO2. Injection of pure CO2 in natural gas hydrates involves low permeability and rapid formation of new hydrate than can block the sediments. Various ways to modify the concept by addition of other gases as well as environmentally friendly surfactants are discussed. Results from reservoir simulations related to real hydrate reservoirs are presented. These hydrate reservoirs span the range from shallow hydrate reservoir in the Barents Sea to very deep reservoirs offshore Taiwan.