Pentaerythritol encapsulated with boric acid: An efficient composite crosslinker for guar gum fracturing fluid

摘要

Commonly used crosslinker agents often have a low crosslinking efficiency with guar gum, the major component of fracturing fluid for crude oil recovery, and it often required a high loading of guar gum for achieving desired recovery from low-permeability reservoir. Nevertheless, a high-loading of guar gum might result in excessive residue and reduce the conductivity of the reservoir. Therefore, boric acid, a commonly used crosslinking agent, was introduced onto the surface of pentaerythritol to afford a composite crosslinking agent denoted as PB. The as-prepared PB crosslinker was characterized by Fourier-transform infrared spectrometry. The guar gum fracturing gel crosslinked with the PB had fantastic viscoelasticity and thermal stability and could reduce the guar gum loading by 16.7%, with boric acid as a control. Besides, the gel-broken liquid had good compatibility with the simulated water and caused reduced damage to rock core, showing potential for hydraulic fracturing of low-permeability reservoirs. (c) 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2019, 136, 48528.