TY - JOUR
T1 - Hydrothermal conversion of oil shale
T2 - Synthetic oil generation and micro-scale pore structure change
AU - Saeed, Shadi A.
AU - Taura, Usman
AU - Al-Wahaibi, Yahya
AU - Al-Muntaser, Ameen A.
AU - Yuan, Chengdong
AU - Varfolomeev, Mikhail A.
AU - Al-Bahry, Saif
AU - Joshi, Sanket
AU - Djimasbe, Richard
AU - Suwaid, Muneer A.
AU - Kadyrov, Rail I.
AU - Galeev, Ranel I.
AU - Naabi, Ahmed
AU - Hasani, Majid
AU - Busaidi, Rashid Said Al
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was requested and fully funded by DALEEL Petroleum as part of the EJAAD agreement. The authors from Kazan Federal University also acknowledge the support from the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation under agreement No. 075-15-2020-931 within the framework of the development program for a world-class Research Center “Efficient development of the global liquid hydrocarbon reserves”.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Elsevier Ltd
PY - 2022/3/1
Y1 - 2022/3/1
N2 - In this work, the hydrothermal conversion of oil shale from Natih B Formation (Oman) was evaluated at different temperatures (300, 350 and 400 °C) and 2291.6 psi (close to the reservoir pressure) using both crushed and uncrushed core samples. The performance of hydrothermal conversion of oil shale was evaluated in terms of material balance (yield of synthetic oil and gas), composition of evolved gases, synthetic oil quality (SARA fractions, elemental analysis, alkanes distribtuion by GC, and aliphtics and aromatic structure change by GC–MS etc.), and the change in organic matter (OM) in the core by LF-NMR. In addition, the change in pore size and structure was also investigated by X-ray computed tomography. The results show that 350 °C gives the best performance for the hydrothermal conversion of oil shale to generate synthetic oil in terms of synthetic oil yield and quality. The high quality of synthetic oil is manifested by a much higher content of aliphatic hydrocarbons than aromatics; a higher amount of saturates and aromatics (light fractions) than resins and asphaltenes (heavy fractions); and a higher amount of light alkanes (especially C10-C20) with a lower amount of heavy alkanes (especial C26-C36). The hydrothermal conversion of OM was confirmed by LF-NMR technique. It was found that hydrothermal treatment induced a significant increase in pore size and porosity with the formation of connected pore channels, resulting in the transformation of oil shale from an extremely low permeable into a higher permeable porous medium. This change in rock properties benefits the subsequent injection of any fluids for the conversion and production of oil shale in field. These promising results technically prove the potential for the development of shale oil from Natih B Formation by hydrothermal conversion.
AB - In this work, the hydrothermal conversion of oil shale from Natih B Formation (Oman) was evaluated at different temperatures (300, 350 and 400 °C) and 2291.6 psi (close to the reservoir pressure) using both crushed and uncrushed core samples. The performance of hydrothermal conversion of oil shale was evaluated in terms of material balance (yield of synthetic oil and gas), composition of evolved gases, synthetic oil quality (SARA fractions, elemental analysis, alkanes distribtuion by GC, and aliphtics and aromatic structure change by GC–MS etc.), and the change in organic matter (OM) in the core by LF-NMR. In addition, the change in pore size and structure was also investigated by X-ray computed tomography. The results show that 350 °C gives the best performance for the hydrothermal conversion of oil shale to generate synthetic oil in terms of synthetic oil yield and quality. The high quality of synthetic oil is manifested by a much higher content of aliphatic hydrocarbons than aromatics; a higher amount of saturates and aromatics (light fractions) than resins and asphaltenes (heavy fractions); and a higher amount of light alkanes (especially C10-C20) with a lower amount of heavy alkanes (especial C26-C36). The hydrothermal conversion of OM was confirmed by LF-NMR technique. It was found that hydrothermal treatment induced a significant increase in pore size and porosity with the formation of connected pore channels, resulting in the transformation of oil shale from an extremely low permeable into a higher permeable porous medium. This change in rock properties benefits the subsequent injection of any fluids for the conversion and production of oil shale in field. These promising results technically prove the potential for the development of shale oil from Natih B Formation by hydrothermal conversion.
KW - Hydrothermal conversion
KW - Kerogen
KW - Oil shale
KW - Pore structure
KW - Synthetic oil
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U2 - 10.1016/j.fuel.2021.122786
DO - 10.1016/j.fuel.2021.122786
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85121278623
SN - 0016-2361
VL - 312
JO - Fuel
JF - Fuel
M1 - 122786
ER -