Gel conformance treatments increase oil production in Wyoming

Abstract

Chromic-carboxylate acrylamide-polymer gels have been applied successfully as conformance treatments in a number of fields in Wyoming's Big Horn basin. This paper reports that as a result of these treatments, significant amounts of incremental oil will be recovered in a profitable manner. The gels were applied to naturally fractured reservoirs of intermediate fracture intensity. The gel treatments improved sweep efficiency of oil-recovery drive fluids in fields that were under either primary production, waterflooding, or polymer-augmented waterflooding. Ultimate incremental oil production from the 29 gel treatments is projected to be 3.72 million st-tk bbl, or on average, 128,000 bbl/treatment. An average 13 bbl of incremental production are projected to be recovered for every 1 lb of polymer injected.