West Hackberry Tertiary Project

The West Hackberry Tertiary Project is a field test of the concept that air injection can generate tertiary oil recovery through the Double Displacement Process. The Double Displacement Process is the gas displacement of a water invaded oil column for the purpose of recovering tertiary oil through gravity drainage. The novel aspect of this project is the use of air as the injection fluid. In Gulf Coast oil reservoirs with pronounced bed dip, reservoir performance has shown that gravity drainage recoveries average 80% to 90% of the original oil in place while water drive recoveries average 50% to 60% of the original oil in place. The target for tertiary oil recovery with the Double Displacement Process is the incremental oil between the 50% to 60% water drive recoveries and the 80% to 90% gravity drainage recoveries. The use of air injection in this process combines the benefits of air's low cost and universal accessibility with the potential for improved oil recovery resulting from spontaneous in situ combustion. If successful, this project will demonstrate that utilizing air injection in the Double Displacement Process will result in an economically viable tertiary process in many Gulf Coast oil reservoirs where other tertiary processes are presently uneconomic. The West Hackberry Tertiary Project receives matching funds from the United States Department of Energy (DOE) as part of the DOE's Class 1 Program for the development of advance recovery technologies in fluvial dominated deltaic reservoirs. In addition, the Petroleum Engineering Department at Louisiana State University (LSU) provides independent study and technology transfer