| Abstract: | This paper describes polymerization and properties of a number of water-soluble polymers suitable for enhanced oil recovery applications. The polymers described here can tolerate long-term exposure to hostile environment conditions of elevated temperatures and high salinity and hardness levels encountered in deeper petroleum reservoirs. The stable polymers reported here, in principle contain two or more of the following monomers: acrylamide, N-vinyl-2-pyrrolidone, sodium 2-acrylamido-2-methylpropanesulfonate and N,N-dimethylacrylamide in proper ratios. The polymers reported here can be used directly to increase the viscosity of the injected water and consequently reducing its mobility to recover additional oil from petroleum reservoirs. Alternatively, these polymers can be used in combination with a suitable crosslinker to produce gels in-situ to block high permeability channels or fractures under hostile environment applications. |
