Abstract The performances of surfactant-polymer (SP) and alkali-polymer (AP) systems in recovering heavy oil were systematically compared via interfacial tension (IFT), emulsification, and oil displacement experiments. Significant differences of heavy-oil-recovery mechanism by SPs and APs are firstly revealed, those are, ultra-low IFT and oil-in-water (O/W) emulsification dominate using the former, while water-in-oil (W/O) emulsification dominates using the latter. Further more, AP (and its corresponding mechanisms) significantly outperform the SP in terms of heavy-oil recovery. Fortunately, the SPs can be improved by increasing the slug size, using preformed particle gels or bubble assistance, among which bubble-assisted ultra-low-IFT SP (foam) behaved the best. The success of AP and foam suggests two feasible routes for improving heavy-oil recovery: (i) forming W/O emulsions using alkali-containing systems; and (ii) improving ultra-low-IFT systems using profile-control agents, e.g. bubble. If the problem of scaling using alkali is considered, then the second idea may be the best option.

中文翻译：

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表面活性剂与碱聚合物驱稠油驱油机理与性能对比研究

摘要 通过界面张力（IFT）、乳化和驱油实验，系统比较了表面活性剂-聚合物（SP）和碱-聚合物（AP）体系在稠油采收中的性能。首次揭示了SPs和APs在稠油回收机理上的显着差异，即以超低IFT和水包油（O/W）乳化为主，而油包水（W/W） O) 乳化占主导地位，使用后者。此外，AP（及其相应机制）在重油采收率方面明显优于 SP。幸运的是，可以通过增加段塞尺寸、使用预制颗粒凝胶或气泡辅助来改善 SP，其中气泡辅助超低 IFT SP（泡沫）表现最好。AP 和泡沫的成功提出了两种提高稠油采收率的可行途径：(i) 使用含碱体系形成 W/O 乳液；(ii) 使用剖面控制剂（例如气泡）改进超低 IFT 系统。如果考虑使用碱的结垢问题，那么第二种想法可能是最好的选择。