Asphaltene flocculation and collapse from petroleum fluids

Deposition of complex and heavy organic compounds, which exist in petroleum crude and heavy oil, can cause a number of severe problems, To prevent deposition inside the reservoir, in the well head and inside the transmission lines, it is necessary to be able to predict the onset and amount of deposition due to various factors. In the present paper, the mechanism of asphaltene deposition, which is the major cause of most organic deposition cases, is modeled based on statistical mechanics of polydisperse polymer solutions joined with the kinetic theory of aggregation and its predictive capability is discussed. Utilization of statistical mechanics of polydisperse polymer solutions joined with kinetic theory of aggregation enables us to develop a realistic model which is able to predict both reversible and irreversible heavy organic depositions. The present model is capable of describing several reversible and irreversible situations, such as the phenomena of organic deposition, growing mechanism of heavy organic aggregates, the size distributions of precipitated organics and the solubility of heavy organics in a crude oil due to variations in oil pressure, temperature and composition. As an example, the present model is applied for heavy organics deposition prediction of two different Brazilian crude oils for which experimental data are available. It is shown that the prediction results of the present model are in good agreement with the experimental data. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.