Enhancing the Rheological Properties of Water-Based Drilling Fluid by Utilizing of Environmentally-Friendly Materials

Recently, many materials have shown that they can be used as alternatives to chemicals materials in order to be used to improve the properties of drilling fluids. Some of these materials are banana peels and corn cobs which both are considered environmentallyfriendly materials. The results of the X-ray diffraction examination have proved that the main components of these materials are cellulose and hemicellulose, which contribute greatly to the increasing of the effectiveness of these two materials. Due to their distinct composition, these two materials have improved the rheological properties (plastic viscosity and yield point) and reduced the filtration of the drilling fluids to a large extent. The addition rates used for each of the two materials (banana peels and corn cob) are 1%, 2%, 3%, 4%, 5% and 6%. As regard to banana peels, the results have shown that there is a direct correlation between the addition ratios, the increase in the rheological properties (plastic viscosity and yield point), and the decrease in filtration The corn cob has shown the same results. Also, 0.01% increase in the pH value was observed when adding a corn cob, while adding banana peels showed the opposite, as adding them led to 0.02% decrease in the pH value. Among the other properties that have been studied is density, as it has been noticed that there is no significant effect of these two materials on the density of drilling fluid. Moreover, the performance of these two materials has been compared with the PAC polymer. This research suggests that the possibility of moving towards corn cob and dried banana peels as additives for biodegradable drilling fluid. Apart from being environmentally friendly, the choice of using them is considered economically more efficient than other chemical additives. By all accounts, the above materials are an increasingly rational choice for moving forward for an environmentally friendly oil industry. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Journal of Petroleum Research and Studies PISSN: 2220-5381 EISSN: 2710-1096 Open Access No. 32, September 2021, pp.66-81 67


Introduction:
Drilling the wellbore is the primary and the furthermost expensive stage in the oil industry. Payments for drilling may be approximately 25% of the entire oil field exploitation cost and mostly on exploration and the progress of well [1]. Drilling fluids, may have a price of about one fifth (15-18%) of the entire cost of oil well drilling. However, three significant elements should be focused on: easy to be used, not excessively expensive and environmentally responsive [2].
Given the high environmental stresses on the oil and gas business to stop the damage of marine incomes and coastal environments, the requirement for environmentally responsive clay essences has converted to a right way for environmentally friendly drilling [3 and 4]. That made the production of chemicals additives very important by means of locally waste materials. The anxiety for the environmental care and environmental rules is a growing demand on the oil and industry [5].
The petroleum industry is hopefully investigating drilling muds and its additives for instance non-toxic viscosity governor and fluid loss controller additives in drilling fluid [6]. The practical performance of the drilling mud may not be considered, however, the environmental impact of this mud and its additives shows an important part as it controls the nature of the drilling fluid [7]. It is necessary to confirm the technical and environmental custom of the drilling fluid additive before it can be used [8].
The possibility of using dried banana peels to improve the performance of drilling mud, and the results have enhanced the possibility of using this environmentally friendly material. These researchers used several percentages of dried banana peels, all of which were successful in increasing the viscosity and reducing filtration [9].
Mosier et al found that adding corn cob to drilling mud improves its rheological properties and reduces filtration. This research aims to delve into the impact of local materials that have the potential to decompose and can be considered environmentally friendly and that are not exploited by industrially, such as corn cob and dried banana peels in order to improve the efficiency of drilling fluid [10]. With the increase in the global demand for fossil oil, there is an increasing need for economic technologies, such as conducting research on environmentally friendly and at the same time effective materials [11]. The new thing in this research is that a comparison was made between the performance of corn cob and dried banana peels at different concentrations, and then a comparison of the performance of both materials with PAC Polymer, which led to a comprehensive awareness of the effect of both materials on the drilling mud.

Corn Cob Cellulose:
Corncobs are a lignocellulosic substantial collected of cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin. Those polymeric fibers involve monomeric particles. Cellulose is constructed of C6 sugars, hemicellulose mostly of the C5 sugars xylose and arabinose. Lignin is made up of phenolic macromolecules [12]. Hemicellulose and lignin are entrenched It should be noted that the origin of the atom used in this research is southern Mexico, and it was purchased from the supermarket in Baghdad.

Banana Peel:
Banana peels were washed with water, dried in the sun for 48 hours, and then dried in a hot oven at 50°C for 30 minutes. Then, it is grinded with a regular grinder to pass through a 50 mesh sieve [15 and 16] and as shown in Figure ( Cellulose has a strong crystalline structure and is resistant to hydrolysis. Unlike hemicellulose, this has a high molecular weight. Cellulose acts as a support material in plant cell walls.

PAC:
It is an enormously extraordinary viscosity fluid loss agent with a too high yield and outstanding viscosifier and has shale inhibiting characteristics [17]. This natural material of unusual purity (> 98%) acts as a catalyst for the preparation of drilling fluids in order to modify the flow and filtration properties of water-based drilling fluids [18]. Figure (3) shows Iraqi bentonite and PAC polymer.

Apparatus and devices:
To pass all laboratory tests in this work, the following laboratory equipment and tools are required, as shown in Figure (4

Results and Discussion:
Attention on environmental safety and environmental regulations is focused on the increasing request for the oil and gas exploration manufacturing. The petroleum industry is fortified to seek drilling fluids and their additives for instance non-toxic viscosity reducers and fluid loss control additives in drilling mud [19].The results of X-ray diffraction, as shown in Figure (5) and Table (2), show that the Iraqi bentonite contains a high percentage of montmorillonite, about 73% as a major mineral This mineral is characterized by the weak cohesion between its plates, as it is rapidly dispersed with water, but its ability to gel is weak. As a result, its ability to gel is not strong because it contains a high percentage of attapulgite, which liberates water easily from inside it. Therefore, its filtration is high and therefore it must be treated with organic colloids that reduce filtration.

Conclusions:
The orientation of this research is to use environmentally-friendly and recycled materials in the oil industry in order to obtain an oil industry that is less polluting to the environment. Dried banana peels showed excellent performance as an enhancer for rheological properties and reduced filtration and have 95% similar to the performance of PAC polymer. On the other hand, the performance of corn cob is 35% lower than that of banana peels performance. The reason is due to the nature of the banana peels and because it contains a high percentage of cellulose.
Although the corn cob gives performance lower than PAC and banana peels by an estimated 35%, it can be used to prepare drilling fluids of low viscosity in order to get remarkable drilling speed and reduce the pressure loss due to friction to the minimum possible. The reason is that sometimes drilling fluids with high viscosity lead to create high pressures at the start of circulation of the drilling fluid and at download and remove the drill rod and lower the liner pipes. This causes the cracking of the layers and the loss of fluid in them. Therefore, it is evident from the above that corn cob powder can be used to prepare drilling fluids of low viscosity, and dried banana peel powder to prepare drilling fluids of high viscosity. The results prove the possibility of using dried banana peels and corn cob as good alternatives to synthetic polymers.