Retention ScreeningSAMPLEby Adel Labs
Does retained surfactant fit the screening budget?
Interactive screening tool
Appearance
Live readoutPASS
Cret
RFinc
Total UTCUTC
Net margin
Gate margin Bmax − Cret
Screening variables — primary
0.155 mg/g
1.60 USD/lb
0.55
Surfactant EOR · HTHS carbonates

Does retained surfactant fit the screening budget?

This page screens a surfactant flood in a high-temperature, high-salinity carbonate on one question: does the cost of the surfactant left on the rock fit the budget a field project can carry? Laboratory recovery Rlab is scaled to field incremental recovery RFinc through the maturity ratio and the volumetric sweep. The retained surfactant mass is then priced per incremental barrel as the retention cost Cret, tested against the retention budget Bmax, and carried into the unit technical cost stack against the screening oil price. Every input is a SAMPLE value, and the 0.11 mg·g−1 target retention is a SAMPLE screening target. At the scenario specified in Section 2 the transform returns RFinc = and a retention cost Cret = , which the Bmax = screening ceiling, against a total unit technical cost of and a net margin of .

SAMPLE Computed in the browser from the SAMPLE inputs in Section 2

Retention cost Cret · USD/inc. bbl
RFinc · % OOIP
Total UTC · USD/inc. bbl
Gate margin Bmax − Cret

This page is a general screening tool that runs on SAMPLE inputs. Manuscript prepared; pending review. Interactive materials and supporting files are not currently offered for public access.

Scenario record

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Prepared by
Imad A. Adel
Subject
Surfactant EOR · HTHS carbonates
Basis
SAMPLE inputs · general screening tool
Scenario status
BASE CASE
Summary of results — current scenariobase case
Retention cost Cret
Gate margin
RFinc
Retained mass Mloss
lb per inc. bbl
Total UTC
Net margin
HOW TO USE
What this is
This page is a general screening tool that runs on SAMPLE inputs. The page opens on a SAMPLE base case — Γ = 0.155 mg/g-rock, Ps = 1.60 USD/lb, Ev = 0.55, Rlab = 84.0 % of Sorw — and the status field reads BASE CASE until an input changes.
Parameters
Every input lives in Section 2. Retention Γ, surfactant price Ps and sweep efficiency Ev carry sliders at the top of that section; the recovery basis, the economic frame and the four base unit-technical-cost rows are entered numerically.
Live model
Sections 7 to 10 recompute from Section 2 on every edit: the recovery transform, the retention-cost gate, the unit technical cost stack, and the two Cret maps.
Figures are interactive
Hover for exact values, drag to zoom, double-click to reset the axes, and use the camera icon to download a PNG.
Export and reset
Export scenario downloads a text file of all inputs and computed outputs at full precision. Reset base case restores the SAMPLE base case.
Where things are
Screening method, governing equations and SAMPLE calibration anchors in Section 1, parameters in Section 2, screening outputs in Sections 7 to 10, assumptions and limitations in Section 11.
Section 01 · Basis and screening method

Basis and screening method

The screening turns a laboratory displacement result into a field-scale test of what the retained surfactant costs. Stage A scales recovery to an OOIP basis; Stage B prices the surfactant left on the rock per incremental barrel; Stage C holds that price against a budget and carries it into the unit technical cost stack. Every input on this page is a SAMPLE value.
Stage A — Volumetric upscaling

Laboratory tertiary recovery is reported as a fraction of Sorw. Field screening requires incremental recovery on an OOIP basis, so Rlab is scaled by the maturity ratio Sorw/Soi and the volumetric sweep efficiency Ev, and capped at the technical limit RFtech.

Stage B — Retention pricing

Cret prices the surfactant mass retained on rock after the post-flush material balance, per incremental barrel. It excludes mobile surfactant in the produced stream, polymer and alkali costs, water handling, and facilities.

Stage C — Gate and cost stack

The retention budget Bmax gates field translation, and the inversion of the retention-cost relation returns the maximum allowable retention Γmax for a given budget. Cret then enters the unit technical cost stack against the screening oil price. At the current scenario Cret = and Γmax at Bmax is .

Governing equations — screening relations
SAMPLE calibration anchors (not editable). K = 12.5 is the lumped constant in Cret = K · Γ · Ps / Ev. Γr,max = 0.165 mg/g-rock, Cret,base = 5.64 USD per incremental bbl, Ps,base = 1.60 USD/lb, RFinc,base = 22.2 % OOIP and Mloss = 3.52 lb per incremental bbl are the SAMPLE calibration anchors of the two Γmax forms. Each is computed from K and the SAMPLE base case, not entered. Displayed values carry one decimal (Γmax three); the scenario export carries full precision.
Section 02 · Scenario parameters

Scenario parameters

The specification below opens at a SAMPLE base case. Every field is editable, and Sections 7 to 10 recompute from these values. Retention Γ, surfactant price Ps and volumetric sweep Ev are the screening variables and carry sliders; the remaining fields are entered numerically. Temperature, salinity and permeability are not model inputs; they act only through the values entered for recovery, retention and sweep.
Screening variables — primary
0.155 mg/g
0.10SAMPLE target 0.110.28
1.60 USD/lb
0.75markers 1.25 · 1.60 · 2.002.50
0.55
0.40polymer-assisted sweep assumption0.80
2.1 · Screening variables

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ParameterValue ✎Unit
mg/g-rock
USD/lb
fraction
2.2 · Recovery basis

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ParameterValue ✎Unit
% of Sorw
fraction
% OOIP
2.3 · Economic frame

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ParameterValue ✎Unit
USD/inc. bbl
USD/inc. bbl
USD/bbl
2.4 · Unit technical cost — base rows

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Cost elementValue ✎Unit
USD/inc. bbl
USD/inc. bbl
USD/inc. bbl
USD/inc. bbl
Retained mass Mloss = K · Γ / Ev = lb per incremental bbl  ·  Cret = USD per incremental bbl  ·  RFinc = % OOIP  ·  base rows sum USD per incremental bbl. The four base rows above are SAMPLE screening assumptions; the retention row is computed, never entered.
Section 07 · Recovery transform · live

Recovery transform

Field screening requires incremental recovery on an OOIP basis. Sorw/Soi is the maturity ratio linking remaining oil after waterflooding to initial oil saturation, and Ev is the field volumetric sweep efficiency, treated as a conditional input dependent on polymer-assisted sweep rather than a laboratory result. At Rlab = % of Sorw, Sorw/Soi = and Ev = , the transform returns RFinc = % OOIP against a volumetric ceiling of % OOIP even at Rlab = 100 %. Near that limit RFinc is sensitive to Ev: at the SAMPLE Sorw/Soi = 0.48 and Rlab = 84.0 %, RFinc falls from 22.2 % OOIP at Ev = 0.55 to 16.1 % OOIP at Ev = 0.40.
Fig. 6
Fig. 6 — Incremental recovery factor over the sweep–recovery plane. RFinc = min(Rlab · Sorw/Soi · Ev, RFtech) in % OOIP, contoured over Ev = 0.40–0.80 and Rlab = 50–100 % of Sorw on a 120 × 100 grid; the flat upper region is the volumetric ceiling RFtech. The dashed curve is the isoline at the current RFinc, the amber star is the SAMPLE base case at (0.55, 84.0), and the open marker is the current scenario. Recomputes from Section 2.
Section 08 · Retention-cost gate · live

Retention-cost gate

A retention budget B in USD per incremental bbl sets the economic limit for retention-controlled screening. The SAMPLE base case uses Bmax = 6 USD per incremental bbl as the upper-limit gate on the retention penalty and Bperf = 4 USD per incremental bbl as the preferred early screen. Inverting the retention-cost relation converts the budget into a maximum allowable retention Γmax. At the current scenario Γmax = at Bmax, against an operating retention of .
Fig. 7
Fig. 7 — Maximum allowable retention satisfying the retention-cost budget. (a) Γmax (mg/g-rock) contoured over surfactant price Ps = 0.75–2.50 USD/lb and budget B = 2–8 USD per incremental bbl at fixed RFinc,base = 22.2 % OOIP; the diverging scale is centred on Γr,max = 0.165 mg/g-rock, the dashed line is that isoline, the dash-dot horizontal is the current Bmax, the dotted verticals are the price markers 1.25, 1.60 and 2.00 USD/lb, and the amber star is the SAMPLE base case at (1.60, 5.64), its retention cost at the base price. (b) Γmax against RFinc in % OOIP for B = current Bmax (solid), Bperf (dashed) and 8 USD per incremental bbl (long dash-dot); the petrol fill is the region satisfying Bmax, the grey band lies beyond the technical limit RFtech, and the open marker is the current scenario. The contours and curves use the anchored Γmax form (0.1755 mg/g-rock at the SAMPLE base case and Bmax), while the meta line above the figure shows the readout form (0.165 mg/g-rock); Section 11 states the difference. Recomputes from Section 2.
Gate verdict

At Γ = and Ps = , the retention cost is Cret = against Bmax = .

Section 09 · Unit technical cost · live

Unit technical cost

Retention Γ drives Cret linearly, so retention is the primary optimisation parameter for widening screening margin and lowering unit technical cost. The stack below decomposes the per-incremental-bbl cost into facilities CAPEX, OPEX, non-surfactant chemical spend, effective surfactant, and the retained-mass penalty carried in Cret. Lowering retention to the SAMPLE target Γ = 0.11 mg·g−1 at base price and sweep reduces Cret to 4.00 USD/bbl, freeing 1.64 USD/bbl inside the retention budget. At the current scenario the total unit technical cost is against a screening oil price of , leaving a net margin of .
Fig. 8
Fig. 8 — Unit technical cost stack at the screening oil price, USD per incremental bbl. The four petrol bars are the base cost rows entered in Section 2, stacked; the red bar is the computed retention cost Cret; the ink bar is the total unit technical cost and the closing bar is the net margin against the dashed oil-price line. Bar labels carry one decimal. Recomputes from Section 2.
Section 10 · Retention-cost maps · live

Retention-cost maps

The retention-cost screening links two coupled parameters: Γ sets Cret at fixed Ps, while Ev sets RFinc and shifts the iso-cost contours. The maps below evaluate Cret = K · Γ · Ps / Ev in the sweep–retention and price–retention planes, with the Bmax and Bperf iso-cost boundaries drawn on both. The SAMPLE base case lies 0.36 USD per incremental bbl inside the Bmax boundary: at base price and sweep, a retention increase of 0.010 mg/g-rock closes the gate. Strategies that reduce Γ widen the margin without requiring higher Ev.
Fig. 9
Fig. 9 — Retention-cost maps, Cret in USD per incremental bbl. (a) Cret over sweep efficiency Ev = 0.45–0.75 and retention Γ = 0.10–0.275 mg/g-rock at the current surfactant price. (b) Cret over Ps = 0.75–2.50 USD/lb and the same retention range at the current sweep efficiency; dotted verticals are the price markers. The diverging scale is centred on the current Bmax, petrol below the gate and red above it; the solid line is the Bmax iso-cost boundary and the dashed line is Bperf. The amber star is the SAMPLE base case at Γ = 0.155 mg/g-rock, the red star is the 0.11 mg/g-rock SAMPLE retention target, and the open marker is the current scenario. Recomputes from Section 2.
Section 11 · Assumptions and limitations

Assumptions and limitations

Assumptions and limitations
    How this was computed

    Every number on this page is computed in the browser from the SAMPLE inputs in Section 2. Incremental recovery is the laboratory recovery scaled by the maturity ratio and the sweep efficiency and capped at the technical limit. The retention cost is Cret = K · Γ · Ps / Ev with the SAMPLE constant K = 12.5; the gate compares it with the budget Bmax, and inverting it gives the maximum allowable retention at a budget. The unit technical cost adds Cret to the four SAMPLE base cost rows and is read against the screening oil price.

    The calibration anchors printed in Section 1 are computed from K and the SAMPLE base case. The page carries no experimental record; every default is a SAMPLE value, and any value a reader enters replaces it.

    Screening under the stated assumptions. Cret prices retained surfactant mass only; it is not a project NPV model.