Experimental Investigations on the Gelation Behavior of Partially Hydrolyzed Polyacrylamide ? Hexamine ? Pyrocatechol Gels

This article presents an investigation on the effect of several parameters on the gelation behavior of partially hydrolyzed polyacrylamide ? hexamine ? pyrocatechol gel system which may be used as sealant to control excessive water production from hydrocarbon reservoirs. In this work, a polymer gel comprised of partially hydrolyzed polyacrylamide as a water-soluble polymer and hexamine and pyrocatechol as organic cross-linking agents of low toxicity was prepared in brine solution.The bottle testing method is used for the qualitative determination of the gelation behavior of the developed gel system and the time for the formation of stiff gel is reported. In this study, the temperature was varied from 80°C to 120°C and polymer and cosslinker concentration varied from 0.8 to 1.1 wt.% and 0.6 to 0.9 wt.% respectively. The experimental study investigates that the gelation time is mainly affected by temperature, polymer and crosslinker concentration and the developed gel is stable up to 120°C which shows its potential to control the excessive water production of high temperature reservoirs.