Study On Flow Characteristics Of Emulsion-suspending Liquid Of Heavy Oil

Heavy oil emulsified viscosity reduction technique is one of the most important viscosity-reducing methods in the exploitation and pipeline transportation of heavy oil. When pipeline transportation of emulsion-suspending liquid of heavy oil, its flow characteristics would be complex because of the shear action and temperature influences.Starting with the method of preparing the emulsion-suspending liquid, this paper develops a apparent viscosity correlation of the emulsion-suspending liquid. For the ChenNan heavy oil, sodium oleate and other eight emulsifiers are tested based on the stability and the viscosity-reducing effect of the emulsion. Through experiments, the optimum emulsifier compound formula is span80(25.8%) and sodium dodecyl benzene sulfonate(74.2%) which can reduce the viscosity by 98%. Then the impacts of different oil to water mass ration, different concentration of emulsifier, different emulsifying temperature, different emulsifying strength, different cooling rate on the formation of the emulsion-suspending liquid are studied. On this basis, the paper develops a apparent viscosity correlation considered the effect of temperature based on the P&R model.On a basis of survey and research of the existing pipe flow simulation devices, the paper designs a small pipe flow simulation device with the helical blade as drive mechanism. Then prove that the device can drive the fluid and the pressure drop correlation is identified. After that, the impacts of different water cut, different velocity, different temperature on the pressure drop and the change rules of the viscosity of the emulsion-suspending liquid are studied. Finally, according to the experimental data, the viscosity testing results by the small pipe flow simulation device, by the rheometer and by viscosity correlation are compared.