Table 1 Recent advances in Biopolymer-Based enhanced oil recovery.
Researcher(s) & Year | Biopolymer studied | Concise key findings | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|
Gautam Gunaji et al. (2022) | Schizophyllan | Locally sourced schizophyllan proves to be a robust biopolymer for harsh reservoir conditions. It maintained its viscosity after 6 months of high-temperature aging and achieved an incremental oil recovery of 17.25% in a high-salinity, high-temperature core flood, establishing its potential as an effective, locally-produced EOR agent. | |
Castro et al. (2024) | Scleroglucan | Scleroglucan’s viscosity and thermal stability were significantly improved by adding polymer-coated nanoclay. The resulting nanofluid remained stable for over 90 days at 120 °C, demonstrating its potential for high-temperature, high-salinity EOR. | |
Mota et al. (2021) | Diutan Gum | Diutan gum solutions showed strong shear-thinning and gel-like behavior at concentrations above 4300 ppm. The polymer demonstrated good thermal stability across the tested range (20–60 °C) confirming its predictable and robust rheological properties for various applications. | |
Gussenov et al. (2023) | Gelan Gum | Gellan gum’s salt-triggered gelation makes it highly effective for conformance control, outperforming HPAM in fracture plugging. Field tests proved its practical success, yielding 3.52 m³ (22 bbls) of additional oil per kilogram of gellan used and substantially decreasing water production. | |
Serikov et al. (2025) | Welan Gum | Beta vulgaris polymer alone showed poor thermal stability and low viscosity in saline conditions. Blending it with Welan gum significantly improved performance, boosting viscosity to 30 cp. and flow stability by 10% Core flooding experiments with this composite blend confirmed a 26% incremental oil recovery. | |
Sakthivel et al. (2024) | Chitosan | A novel, eco-friendly chitosan salt polymer, prepared in a simple one-step aqueous process, demonstrated excellent stability in reservoir conditions. It successfully altered carbonate rock wettability from oil-wet to more water-wet and achieved an incremental oil recovery of 16.2% outperforming commercial surfactants like AOS and CTAB in core flooding and imbibition tests. | |
Elsaeed et al. (2021) | Guar Gum | Newly synthesized guar gum hydrogels (GH and GBH) were developed as robust EOR agents for high-salinity conditions. The hydrogels successfully delayed water breakthrough and significantly improved oil production, with the GH polymer increasing ultimate oil recovery to over 72% (from 58.42%5with water). The biochar-composite version (GBH) also proved effective at a lower concentration, confirming their potential for challenging reservoirs. | |
Mohammad et al. (2025) | Hydroxyethyl Cellulose (HEC) | This study presents a novel, integrated system where hydroxyethyl cellulose (HEC) simultaneously addresses three major challenges. The HEC-enhanced process achieved up to 99.2%CO₂ capture efficiency, reduced brine salinity by up to 32.4%and demonstrated the potential to increase oil recovery by up to 65%in core flooding tests, highlighting its unique multifunctionality. | |
Rellegadla et al. (2021) | Carboxymethyl Cellulose (CMC), Tragacanth Gum | Using a three-stage screening process (rheology, wettability, and core flooding), this study evaluated tragacanth gum (TGU) and hydroxyethyl cellulose (HEC) against carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC) and commercial polyacrylamide (HPAM). TGU and HEC showed superior rheological properties and wettability alteration capabilities. In the final stage, HEC and TGU delivered higher incremental oil recovery (7.38% and 6.71%, respectively) than the widely used HPAM (5.83%). |
