Investigation of the combustion characteristics of Bati Raman oil with sand

In situ combustion (ISC) is one of the thermal oil recovery processes that has been applied in a variety of reservoirs. The energy is generated within the reservoir by a series of multi-step reactions that provide energy to heat the reservoir and reduce oil viscosity. Also, the oil is upgraded in situ by burning heaviest fractions. In this study, combustion characteristics of Bati Raman crude are investigated. The Bati Raman oil field is the largest known oil field in Turkey. Ramped temperature oxidation (RTO) experiments with effluent gas analysis (EGA) are performed with oil-sand mixtures having different sand particle size. The results are analyzed using isoconversional kinetic approach, which is a model-free method, based on effluent gas analysis and temperature measurements. Effective activation energy values are estimated for the sample with two different sand particle size. Besides, for the same samples, laboratory combustion tube experiments are conducted to evaluate ignition and combustion front propagation characteristics. Asphaltene content and API gravity of the oil sample prior to experiments and produced oil are measured and compared. Results indicate that the oil is upgraded through a reduction in asphaltene content. A complete set of kinetics and combustion experiments are provided for Bati Raman oil. There are only limited number of studies in the literature to link kinetic experiments to proposed reaction models of ISC. This work presents a way to link a reaction model to isoconversional fingerprint obtained through kinetic experiments. In addition, it is shown that Bati Raman oil exhibits good combustion characteristics and it is associated with its isoconversional fingerprint.