Experimental Investigation of Various Co-solvents and an Environment-Friendly Solvent Efficiencies to Minimize Aromatic Solvents Consumption During Asphaltene Removal

Precipitation and deposition of asphaltene are one of the serious problems in oil industry and has drawn the attention of many researchers in recent decades. The application of aromatic solvents is the most common method of asphaltene removal, especially in oil wells. Xylene, one of most applicable aromatic solvents, creates many environmental issues. Then it is needed to reduce the use of xylene either by co-solvents or replace it with environmentally friendly solvents. The main purpose of this paper is to find an alternative solvent to replace or reduce consumption of aromatic solvents. Firstly, the efficiency of xylene has been evaluated in the presence of co-solvents including kerosene and diesel at different temperatures. Then, terpene as an environment-friendly asphaltene solvent has been studied at ambient temperature and 80 ⁰C. The results show that efficiency of xylene in the presence of kerosene is higher than diesel. Moreover, temperature increase leads to more asphaltene dissolution. Finally, terpene has shown an acceptable solubility compared to aromatic solvents while its efficiency is being reduced dramatically in the presence of kerosene and diesel.