Prof.dr. Frieder Mugele from UT's MESA+ research institute will manage a research consortium that should result in higher oil recovery efficiency. Stichting FOM and the NWO Chemical Sciences field (CW) have recently started a (Chemical) Industrial Partnership Programme (CH)IPP together with the company BP. The parties involved will focus on the physical-chemical processes during oil extraction from sandstone. During the coming five years, a team led by Frieder Mugele from the department of Physics of Complex Fluids will work on this research, which has a budget of over 3 million euros. Dr. Igor Siretanu, from the same department, will act as coordinator and is responsible for the day-to-day management.
The researchers will use both experimental and theoretical techniques on a series of well- defined model systems. In addition they will develop a microchip to monitor the yield of oil recovery on a small scale.
On the boundary of physics and chemistry
Oil recovery is a complex process that is dependent on physical and chemical phenomena at different scales and research into oil recovery covers both physics and chemistry. Therefore FOM and NWO CW have sought collaboration and a unique multidisciplinary research programme has been realised: a mix of an Industrial Partnership Programme (IPP) from FOM and a Chemical Industrial Partnership Programme (CHIPP) from NWO CW.
Multidisciplinary collaboration
This (CH)IPP is a continuation and expansion of a previous successful collaboration between the group of Frieder Mugele and BP. The consortium consists of teams from the University of Twente (Frieder Mugele, Martien Cohen Stuart, Michel Duits, Dirk van den Ende, Igor Siretanu and Cees Otto), FOM Institute AMOLF (Huib Bakker), Utrecht University (René van Roij) and Radboud Universiy Nijmegen (Elias Vlieg). They will also collaborate with the University of California (Miquel Salmeron).
Within the project, two postgraduate researchers and three doctoral candidates will be given appointments at the University of Twente. The research will focus on atomic force microscopy, Raman microscopy in combination with micro-fluidics, X-ray absorption microscopy and research into alterations in macroscopic wettability.
Top Sector Chemistry
The research ties in with the Top Sector Chemistry and the NWO CW Fund New Chemical Innovations (NCI). With this fund, NWO is contributing to the Top Sector Chemistry via the funding of public-private partnership projects in chemistry. For this programme a so-called TKI allowance has been applied for, which is part of the programme budget. The Ministry of Economic Affairs encourages collaboration between companies and knowledge institutions such as universities, NWO, FOM, Technology Foundation STW, TNO and ECN by awarding TKI allowances. These amount to 25 percent of the in-cash private contributions and a smaller allowance for in-kind contributions.
