Research for reducing minimum miscible pressure of crude oil and carbon dioxide and miscible flooding experiment by injecting citric acid isopentyl ester

The minimum miscible pressure is one of the key factors to realize miscible flooding. As the minimum miscible pressure in the research area is higher than the formation fracture pressure, miscible flooding cannot be formed. To address this problem, it is necessary to find a way to reduce the minimum miscible pressure. Citric acid isopentyl ester can not only be dissolved in crude oil, but also be dissolved in carbon dioxide. Therefore, citric acid isopentyl ester was chosen to reduce the minimum miscible pressure in this research. The effect of citric acid isopentyl ester on reducing the minimum miscible pressure was measured by the method of long slim tube displacement experiment. The minimum miscible pressure in the research area was 29.6 MPa. The experimental results show that the minimum miscible pressure could decrease significantly with increasing the injected slug size of citric acid isopentyl ester, but the decrease became smaller and smaller. The optimum injected slug size of the chemical reagent is 0.003 PV. Under the condition of the slug size, the minimum miscible pressure was 24.1 MPa. The reduction was 5.5 MPa. The reduction rate was 18.58%. The research results have important guiding significance for enhancing oil recovery in the research area. (C) 2020 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of King Saud University.