IOR: A New "Term" Explained

Yesterday I linked a great story from Minyanville, and got a great lead from "Anon 1" which eventually led me to a series of articles which might help explain some of the buzz behind Saudi Arabia's investment in what will be America's largest refinery. 

This is the link to the PDF.

At the link there is a nice diagram defining some new terms:

Primary recovery: natural flow and artificial lift --- oil recovery: generally less than 30%.

Second recovery: waterflooding and pressure maintenance -- oil recovery: 30 - 50%.

Tertiary recovery: thermal, gas injection, chemical, other -- oil recovery: >50% and up to 80+%

• Thermal: steam, hot water, combustion
• Gas injection: CO2, hydrocarbon (propane), nitrogen/flue
• Chemical: alkali, surfactant, polymer
• Other: microbial, acoustic, electromagnetic
• IOR: improved oil recovery includes both secondary and tertiary recovery methods
• EOR: enhanced oil recovery pertains to "tertiary recovery" only

An abstract statement: "The option of advanced-secondary-recovery, or improved-oil-recovery (IOR), technologies before full-field deployment of EOR can be a better first option before deployment of capital-intensive EOR projects. The Middle East's general drive toward ultimate oil recovery instead of immediate oil recovery is highlighted in the context of EOR."

Sources of CO2 production:

• Cement: largest industrial source -- 1,000 metric tons of CO2 (MtCO2)/year
• Oil and gas processing: 850 MtCO2/year
• Iron and steel production: 650 MtCO2/year

So, there you have it.

Even if "they" don't ship the CO2 back to Saudi for EOR, there are a lot of EOR opportunities in the US. When I see "EOR" under discussion, I think Denbury (DNR).