Development of Enhanced Oil Recovery Technique using Yeast Cell Wall

2017 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 16K14524
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Earth system and resources engineering
• Research Institution: Kyushu University
• Principal Investigator: Sugai Yuichi 九州大学, 工学研究院, 准教授 (70333862)
• Project Period (FY): 2016-04-01 – 2018-03-31
• Keywords: 石油増進回収 / 酵母細胞壁 / 界面張力 / オートクレーブ / コア試験 / 脂質 / タンパク質 / シミュレーション

Outline of Final Research Achievements

We studied on the availability of yeast cell wall for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) as an interfacial tension reducer. The cell wall solution was hydrothermally treated in order to elute amphiphilic substancesfrom the cell wall to the solution under different conditions such as concentration of the cell wall, temperature and time of the hydrothermal treatment.
The interfacial tension was reduced with increase in concentration of the cell wall and temperature of the hydrothermal treatment. The time of hydrothermal treatment also had influence on the interfacial tension reduction. Core flooding experiments were carried out by injecting the cell wall solution which had been hydrothermally treated after the water flooding as the primary oil recovery. 4 % to 7 % of original oil in place was additionally recovered by injecting the cell wall solution which had been hydrothermally treated. We also investigated the optimum operation conditions of this EOR through the numerical simulation studies.

Free Research Field

資源開発工学