A Study of Flow Properties of Kuwaiti Crude Oil Obtained from Different Sources

The rheological properties of four different Kuwaiti crude oils in the presence of polyacrylamide (PAA) were investigated. PAA was varied at three different concentrations of 25, 50, and 75 ppm to study the viscoelastic properties in the untreated samples. Four different temperatures (25, 30, 35, and 40 °C) were used to evaluate different viscoelastic parameters of the treated and untreated Kuwaiti crude oils. The sulfur content and physical properties; such as, density and refractive index of Kuwaiti crude oils were also measured. An important observation noted from the rheological analysis is that the dynamic viscoelastic parameters like complex modulus, elastic modulus, and storage modulus were found to be a function of the amount of sulfur present in the crude oil. The most important observation noted is that PAA acts as a drag reducing agent in lowering the viscosity, shear stress, and all the viscoelastic parameters of the Kuwaiti crude oil. Carreau model was used in this investigation to determine the relaxation time and the shear thinning characteristics of the treated and untreated crude oil samples at different temperatures.