Flow of heavy crude oil-in-water emulsions in long capillaries simulating pipelines

Flow of heavy crude oil-in-water emulsions in long capillaries simulating pipelines

Heavy crude oil

Oil-in-water emulsions

Rotation viscometry

Tube transportation

Wall sliding

We studied the rheological properties of heavy oil-in-water emulsions with the final goal of decreasing the high viscosity of oil in pipeline transportation. The emulsions containing 3% silica or 5% montmorillonite were stabilized by Triton X-100. All emulsions were viscoplastic media and also demonstrated viscoelasticity. At low shear stresses, emulsions are in gel-like state that was reflected by the independence of the elastic modulus from frequency. The yield stress of basic emulsion is rather low (∼1 Pa), while the introduction of solid particles leads to a remarkable increase of the yield stress. It was shown that direct transition of the rheological data for oil emulsions measured in a rotational device to capillary rheometer appeared impossible. The apparent viscosity of the samples estimated in tubes (as a model of a capillary viscometer) was not correlated with the shear viscosity measured on a rotational rheometer and overall was dependent on the tube/capillary diameter. The reason for these effects may be related to the stratified flow through a tube consisting of near-wall slippage or the existence at the stream periphery of a low-viscosity layer. This phenomenon should be taken into account in designing pipe transportation lines when viscometric data are obtained in the other conditions of flow.

157

Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering

2017-08-01

Malkin, Alexander Ya.

Mironova, Maria V.

Ilyin, Sergey O.

Journal Article

88V8VBH5

0920-4105

10.1016/j.petrol.2017.07.024