RHEOLOGICAL STUDY OF JATROPHA CURCAS OIL AS OBM IN DRILLING OPERATION AND FORMATION DAMAGE CONTROL

The drilling fluid industry has long been plagued with environmental issues, given that the trend of drilling practices seem to be favoring Synthetic Based Mud, which uses mineral oil as the base fluid. The side affects are obvious, given that the usage of non-biodegradable oil that is pumped into the subsurface leads to a significant amount of fluid invasion into the formation. The need therefore arises for a mud system that utilizes biodegradable oil, from renewable sources that can match the rheological properties of the conventionally used mud systems, whilst also leaving a minimal impact on the formation permeability (formation damage).
The ester derived from Jatropha Oil was reported to have similar properties to diesel oil. Hence, given that it is a source of biodiesel that can be renewed (derived from the Jatropha Curcas Plant), the prospect of developing new systemts based on this oil is enticing especially in environmentally protected areas. The idea of having drilling fluid that causes little or no damage to the formation whilst being environmentally stable is one that this paper intends to put forth. This research is focused on achieving industry acceptable rheological specifications for the ester based mud system and comparing it to mineral based systems. Formation damage properties were also measured to indicate the extent of its permeability affects.