Application of functionalized silica-graphene nanohybrid for the enhanced oil recovery performance

Nanoparticles as a part of nanotechnology have drawn numerous attentions for its great potential of enhancing oil recovery. However, the role of nanoparticles in this field is still in its infancy and consequently has attracted much more attention in the last decade. The main objective of the current study is the experimentally investigation of functionalized silica-graphene nanohybrids as a novel stabilizer of water-decalin and water-asphaltene emulsions and its effects on enhanced oil recovery (EOR). The conventional properties of crude oil and the prepared nanofluids were measured to examine the EOR mechanisms. The nanofluids were prepared by synthetic brine (4 wt% NaCl) as the base fluid at various concentrations of the functionalized nanohybrids including 0.01. 0.05, and 0.1 wt%. The phase behavior of the nanohybrids dispersions in presence of NaCl was visually observed. The results showed that the IFT between oil and water can be reduced to about half of its initial value by employing functionalized silica-graphene nanohybrids. The values of IFT decrease via increasing the concentration of nanofluids which indicates a great potential application of the proposed nanofluid for EOR. Moreover, a visualization flooding method (glass micromodel) was employed as a porous media to investigate the EOR mechanisms of the nanofluids.