Increased oil recovery from mature oil fields using gelled polymer treatments

Gelled polymer treatments are applied to oil reservoirs to increase oil production to reduce water production by altering the fluid movement within the reservoir. This research program is aimed at reducing barriers to the widespread use of these treatments by developing methods to predict gel behavior during placement in matrix rock and fractures, determining the persistence of permeability reduction after gel placement, and by developing methods to design production well treatments to control water production. This report describes the progress of the research during the first six months of work. A Dawn EOS multi-angle laser light scattering detector was purchased, installed and calibrated. Experiments were conducted to determine the permeabilities of a bulk gel and of a filter cake which forms when a gel is dehydrated. The pressure at which a gel in a tube is ruptured was measured and was correlated to the length and diameter of the gel