Hybrid of quantum dots for interfacial tension reduction and reservoir alteration wettability for enhanced oil recovery (EOR)

Nanoparticle stabilized emulsions in enhanced oil recovery are more attractive and practical than conventional emulsions which stabilized by colloidal particles and different surfactants due to their advantages and special characteristics such as high stability in harsh condition, move long distance in reservoirs without high retention due to small size of nanoparticles. Only one third of original oil in place (OIP) is usually produced and two third of oil in place will be trapped to reservoir rockthus suitable chemical enhanced oil recovery (C-EOR) methods should be used. In this research, we have suggested a novel, economical and commercial method for synthesis N-doped graphene quantum dots (N-GQDs)/MoS2 quantum dots (MQDs) nanohybrids for preparing different percentage of Nanoemulsions which can reduce alterfacial tension significantly so it can used for Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) application. MoO3 material was used as a base of MQDs. MQDs was synthesized via exfoliation of MoS2 nanoparticles by Butyl lithium under N2 atmosphere condition. N-GQDs were synthesized by citric acid and urea materials via hydrothermal method. GQDs/MQDs were prepared via a simple sol-gel method for 5 h string. Synthetic materials were characterized with X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR), UV–visible absorption, Scanning Microscopic Electron (SEM), EDX profile and mapping, Transmission electron microscopy (TEM), High Resolution Transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). Then, emulsions were prepared with two different cationic and anionic surfactants and the stability and morphology of emulsion droplets were investigated in condition close to reservoir environment. Our results show that 10% GQDs/MQDs in cationic surfactant and 50% GQDs/MQDs in anionic surfactant have good stability and very small and fine emulsion droplets in simulated reservoir conditions in laboratory. The Interfacial Tension (IFT) measurement shows >70% improvement which indicates the high ability of these nanohybrids in reducing the surface tension than previous nanohybrids. Contact angle values show that these nanohybrids can alter the wettability of reservoir rock from oil-wet to water-wet so the trapped oil in the porous region of rock can be easily extracted in the presence of a layer of these nanohybrids. Furthermore, according to the results of altering the density and viscosity of nanohybrids, these are not as limiting parameters and only about 1% increasing observed for density and viscosity, respectively. Coreflooding test revealed the high oil recovery efficiency (22%) at very low nanofluid concentration (0.01 wt%).