DOE/Federal Energy Technology Center, P.O. Box 10940, MS 921-143, Pittsburgh, PA 15236-0940

A -- ADVANCED RECOVERY CONCEPTS FOR OIL EXTRACTION SOL DE-RA26-97BC15017 POC Donna J. Lebetz, Contract Specialist, 412/892-6206; R. Rogus, Contracting Officer, 412/892-6221 WEB: click here to download a copy of solicitation DE-RA26-97BC15017, http://www.petc.doe.gov/business.html. E-MAIL: click here to contact "lebetz@fetc.doe.gov" via e-mail, lebetz@fetc.doe.gov. A -- The Department of Energy's (DOE) Federal Energy Technology Center FETC) plans to issue a Program Research and Development Announcement (PRDA) No. DE-RA26-97BC15017 entitled "Advanced Recovery Concepts for Oil Extraction." Through this PRDA, the U. S. DOE National Petroleum Technology Office (NPTO) seeks basic research proposals on advanced and innovative technology which will substantially increase predictability and improve Advanced Recovery Concepts for oil. This solicitation does not seek proposals which either duplicate current research efforts or offer only minor improvements in process performance, process predictability and material properties. The general objectives of this Advanced Recovery Concept extraction technology PRDA is to support high-risk, long term research which supplements and complements, but does not duplicate or displace private and other public research and development efforts. However, near-term and mid-term goals can be included in the requested proposals. The four (4) areas of interest of Advanced Recovery Concepts are: 1. Gas Flooding. One of the major challenges to improving the oil recovery from carbon dioxide flooding is to reduce the amount of oil bypassed due the poor sweep of carbon dioxide. Past work on mobility control for carbon dioxide flooding using foams, polymers and direct thickeners has shown promise, but has not yielded a widely accepted method. The improvement in sweep for carbon dioxide floods remains a major challenge. The ability to conduct carbon dioxide floods, natural gas floods or nitrogen floods effectively below the miscibility pressure would greatly increase the use of these processes in shallow oil reservoirs. The term "gas flooding" for this PRDA does not include using gas for pressure maintenance or repressurization. 2. Chemical Flooding. Proposals are sought for a) developing low cost surfactants for use in surfactant flooding (surfactant-polymer, micellar-polymer, low tension flooding, alkaline-surfactant-flooding) and b) for the development of low cost polymers for use in polymer flooding (Polymer, Gels, Sweep Improvement, Profile Modification, Reservoir Conformance). 3. Microbial Flooding. Microbial Techniques consist of injecting microbes into the reservoir, thereby generating surfactants, gas, or polymers, which will increase the oil recovery. The use of microbial techniques for the reduction of an environmental problem is not acceptable for this PRDA unless it relates directly to oil recovery. For example, microbial methods which can generate low cost surfactants or polymers at the surface, especially from waste products, are acceptable areas of research. 4. Advanced Recovery Simulation. The PRDA does solicit proposals to develop new or to make major extensions to "mainframe or supercomputer" simulators. Also, scaled down simulators are required which are adequate for "desktop" or "workstation" systems that would be beneficial to the smaller oil producer. It is important to note that the simulator source code, executable files, and appropriate manuals shall be required to be made available to the public through DOE publications. All responsible individuals, corporations, non-profit organizations, educational institutions, and state or local governments may submit proposals for consideration. This PRDA will only be available via internet and will not be distributed in paper form. It is anticipated that solicitation DE-RA26-97BC15017 will be accessible (as a Word Perfect 6.1 (Windows) document or in the Portable Document Format (PDF)) on the World Wide Web (WWW) at http://www.petc.doe.gov/business.html (select "solicitations") on or about May 13, 1997, and that the closing date for submission of proposals will be July 15, 1997. Those who obtain a copy of the solicitation through the WWW should check the location frequently for any amendments. All inquiries regarding this solicitation should be directed to the Point-Of-Contact, Donna J. Lebetz, at the phone no./address above or via internet e-mail to "lebetz@fetc.doe.gov". (0085)

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