Highly stable water-in-oil emulsions are common in the production, transportation, and refining of petroleum and related products. The emulsions are stabilized by a variety of surface-active compounds found in crude oil such as natural surfactants (specifically asphaltenes), carboxylic organic acids, and fine minerals. A critical step in the processing of crude oil is to break the interfacial film formed at the oil/water interface to enable the release of water from the oil. Demulsifiers are commonly used to promote the coalescence and separation of water from the crude oil. However, demulsifiers must compete with other surface active materials found in crude oil. This presentation will describe our research efforts on breaking water-in-oil emulsions focusing on water-in-oil interfacial properties that govern emulsion stability and demulsification. Semi-automated, high throughput techniques for rapid synthesis and screening of demulsifiers were used to determine the effectiveness of various demulsifiers and to develop fundamental understanding of various demulsifiers in emulsion breaking mechanisms.

Effectiveness of demulsifying agents in breaking water-in-crude oil emulsions

2019 Spring National Meeting

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