Theme 1
Heavy Oil and Bitumen
Unconventional petroleum resources are typically defined by being of low mobility — either high viscosity oil (e.g. heavy oil or bitumen) or low permeability reservoir rock (e.g. tight oil and gas, shale). The focus in Theme 1, is on systems containing high viscosity heavy oil and bitumen. Typically, heavy oil has viscosities between thousands and a few tens of thousands of centipoise (unit of dynamic viscosity) whereas bitumen has viscosities exceeding one hundred thousand centipoise and often in the millions of centipoise.
There are two requirements that must be met to produce these resources — first, mobilize the oil (lower its viscosity) and second, move the mobilized oil to a production well. At present, for oil sands reservoirs, bitumen mobility is improved by injecting high temperature and pressure steam into the reservoir. This implies high cost and greenhouse gas emissions from these recovery processes.
Research in Theme 1 is focused on improving oil mobility and imaging, and controlling the recovery processes to lower the environmental impact, improve the economics and raise the energy efficiency of these processes. Theme 1 specific targets of the research being conducted are the use of additives with mild heating to improve bitumen mobilization as well as next generation drilling, monitoring and control to improve recovery process performance.
UCalgary Projects
Asphaltene Deposition Kinetics and Structure
UCalgary Lead: Michelle Dolgos
Molecular Origin of Heavy Oil / Bitumen Viscosity, Asphaltene Self-assembly
UCalgary Lead: Samira Siahrostami
Green Solvents
UCalgary Lead: Hector De la Hoz Siegler
Phoretic flows at Pore Scale
UCalgary Lead: Giovanniantonio Natale, Anne Benneker, Hossein Hejazi
Mass Transport and Edge Chamber Effects
UCalgary Lead: Anne Benneker
Heavy Oil & Bitumen (HOB) Policy Toolkit
UCalgary Lead: Getachew Assefa
Interfacial Tension - Relative Permeability
UCalgary Lead: Hossein Hejazi
Technological-Economic-Social-Environmental Reservoir Simulation Toolkit: TESERS Toolkit
UCalgary Lead: Ian Gates
Rheology in enhanced oil recovery
UCalgary Lead: Giovanniantonio Natale, Anne Benneker
Solvent-Additive (Nanoparticle/Emulsion) Dynamics and Interactions
UCalgary Lead: Qingye (Gemma) Lu
Enzyme enhanced oil recovery
UCalgary Lead: Jinguang Hu
Carbon Recycling in oil sands recovery
UCalgary Lead: Md Golam Kibria
Real Time Low Carbon Technology Assessment using Patent Sentiment Analytics
UCalgary Lead: Alexander Whalley
Beyond Steam – Additives to Significantly Improve the Emissions and Energy Intensities of Oil Sands Recovery Processes
UCalgary Lead: Ian Gates
Next Generation Adaptive Wells and Optimal Placement for Improved Recovery
UCalgary Lead: Roman Shor
Unlocking the Physics and Chemistry of Bitumen/Water/Solvent/Porous Media Interfaces- an Enabling Technology for New Production Process Development
UCalgary Lead: Apostolos Kantzas
Reservoir Management and Advanced Optimization for Thermal and Thermal-Solvent Based Recovery Processes Using Fundamentals, Scaled Models, and Machine Learning
UCalgary Lead: Ian Gates
Engineered Interfaces for Advanced Energy Materials
UCalgary Lead: Milana Trifkovic
Getting Clean Energy from Shale Gas Reservoirs in the Form of Hydrogen Using Solar
UCalgary Lead: Ian Gates
Beyond Steam – Additives to Significantly Improve the Emissions and Energy Intensities of Oil Sands Recovery Processes
UCalgary Lead: Ian Gates
Next Generation Adaptive Wells and Optimal Placement for Improved Recovery
UCalgary Lead: Roman Shor
Improved Knowledge of Potential Environmental Impacts of Shale Gas Development
UCalgary Lead: Bernhard Mayer
Assessing Political Pathways for Energy Transition
UCalgary Lead: Melanee Thomas
GRINSTEM 1: ForScent Inc.
UCalgary Lead: Ian Gates
GRINSTEM 6: EarthImpulse Inc.
UCalgary Lead: Roman Shor
GRINSTEM 7: TOSSA (Towards Optimal Sustainability Space Assessment) decision-support tool
UCalgary Lead: Getachew Assefa
GRINSTEM 10: DeepH2 Inc.
UCalgary Lead: Ian Gates
GRINSTEM 11: Molten Alloy Technology Inc.(MAT)
UCalgary Lead: Ian Gates