Alhreez, M and Wen, D orcid.org/0000-0003-3492-7982 (2018) Controlled releases of asphaltene inhibitors by nanoemulsions. Fuel, 234. pp. 538-548. ISSN 0016-2361
Abstract
Asphaltene precipitation is usually responsible for many flow assurance problems such as wettability changes and pore clogging in reservoirs, fouling in wellbore tubing and production surface facilities. This study develops a novel approach by using nanoemulsions (NE) for controlled delivery and release of asphaltene inhibitors (AI) to minimize asphaltene precipitation with reduced AI amount. LUMiSizer was utilised to study the effectiveness and performance of controlled release by three cases on asphaltene sedimentation: i) strong organic acids (dodecyl benzene sulfonic acid, DBSA), ii) nanoemulsions (blank NEs), and iii) nanoemulsions loaded with DBSA (DBSA NEs). The experiments suggested that the optimum inhibitor concentration for completely stabilizing asphaltene were 4 vol% for DBSA. This amount of inhibitor can be significantly reduced by ∼20 times by using the DBSA NEs, and the release time can be greatly extended. A mechanistic understanding of the controlled release effect is proposed based on interfacial properties and electron microscopic studies, which is related to the hydrophilicity of DBSA and the strong intermolecular interactions among all DBSA NE’s components and the asphaltene molecules.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. This is an author produced version of a paper published in Fuel. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. |
Keywords: | Controlled release; Asphaltene inhibitor; Nanoemulsions; Asphaltene precipitation and stability |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Engineering & Physical Sciences (Leeds) > School of Chemical & Process Engineering (Leeds) |
Funding Information: | Funder Grant number EU - European Union 648375 |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 04 Dec 2018 12:06 |
Last Modified: | 18 Jul 2019 00:41 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Elsevier |
Identification Number: | 10.1016/j.fuel.2018.06.079 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:139507 |
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Filename: Controlled release of asphaltene inhibitor Fuel.pdf
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