The Oil Chemistry Laboratory was established in 2009, and is geographically located at Marineholmen in the city of Bergen, in close vicinity to the University of Bergen. The laboratory is an integrated part of the Department of Wellstream Technology.

The research areas addressed by this laboratory include all aspects of oil production, from reservoir and oil recovery, to long-distance transport of wellstream fluids and flow assurance, to separation issues and to refinery issues.

The close link to our large scale facilities at Tiller addresses the existing gap between fundamental research and macroscopic fluid behaviour, and enables development of in-depth knowledge of the mechanisms that governs multiphase flow behaviour.

The laboratory benefits from close cooperation with other SINTEF units, e.g. Marine Environmental Technology, and with several departments at the University of Bergen, in particular the Department of Chemistry. Our research projects also frequently include student education, such as PhD positions and MSc projects.

The laboratory services include:

Oil characterization

• Extraction of surface active crude oil components (acids and bases)
• Total Acid Number determination (TAN)
• Total Base Number determination (TBN)
• Asphaltene content
• SARA analysis

Surface and Colloid chemistry

• Contact angles (sessile drop)
• Liquid/liquid interfacial tension
• Surface free energy determination of solids (EOS method)
• Emulsion phase inversion (bottle test)
• Emulsion drop size distribution
• Hydrate plug index determination

(Extensive analysis, e.g. chromatographic and spectroscopic methodology (GC-MS, LC-MS, FT-IR), is also available through our cooperative laboratories)

The laboratory instrumentation is under constant expansion, and includes e.g.:

• Microscope set-up
• NIR Imaging set-up
• Shear cell
• Chromatography (HPLC, GPC, SPE)
• Small scale flow loop

Gas hydrate projects:

• HYADES
• GANS
• Hydrate plug index determination