Investigation of the Effect of Graphene-Silica Nanoparticles on Rheological and Thermo-physical Properties of Water-based Drilling Fluid

Drilling mud is one of the most important and basic requirements for drilling oil and gas wells. Optimization of drilling fluid properties leads to reduce drilling time and costs. Water-based drilling mud is one type of drilling fluid that is mainly used in drilling wells due to its environmental compatibility. In this research, in order to increase the efficiency of this type of drilling fluid, graphene and silicon oxide nanoparticles in equal weight ratio in water-based drilling mud have been used. This study investigates the effect of different concentrations (0.25, 0.5, 0.75 and 1% volume fraction) of these nanoparticles on different properties of drilling fluid such as plastic viscosity, yield point, gel strength of 10 minutes and 10 seconds, circulation loss of the samples and the coefficient of thermal conductivity are discussed. All rheological properties tests are performed according to the standard (API RP 13B). The transient hot wire method has been used to determine the thermal conductivity of the fluid. The results show that the increase of nanoparticles has a significant effect on the rheological and thermo-physical properties of water-based drilling mud and reduces plastic viscosity (15%), decreases circulation loss of the samples (25%) and gel strength and also increases the thermal conductivity by 16% in the volume fraction of 1%.