EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION ON NATURAL POLYMER GRAFTED SINGLE AND HYBRID NANOPARTICLES BASED NANOFLUIDS FOR ENHANCED OIL RECOVERY

Nanoparticles have been utilized in chemical-enhanced oil recovery (C-EOR) as a reliable and potential alternative to conventional EOR additives (surfactant and polymer) and an innovative technique for improving different mechanisms in the EOR process. Despite their effectiveness in EOR, their suspensions suffer from low colloidal stability when exposed to harsh reservoir conditions of high salinity and high temperature (HSHT). Recently, polymer grafted nanoparticles surfaces have garnered significant attention as a new trend of nanomaterials for EOR application due to their remarkable properties in improving the dispersion stability with excellent tolerance in HSHT conditions. The reciprocal performance of grafting polymer on the surface of nanoparticles to enhance the microscopic and macroscopic mechanisms of oil displacement efficiency is still insufficiently identified. In this study, different structures of nanoparticles (0-D and 2-D); namely silica (SiO2), alumina (Al2O3), and graphene nanoplatelets (GNPs), were successfully grafted with a natural polymer, Gum Arabic (GA) and later combined to formulate novel hybrid nanofluids via a simple and eco-friendly process.