Use of optimal control theory for computing optimal injection policies for enhanced oil recovery (Q1072509)

The theory of optimal control of distributed parameter systems has been applied to the problem of determining an optimum injection policy for a chemical flooding enhanced oil recovery process. The optimization criterion is to maximize the difference between gross revenue and cost of chemicals injected. Necessary conditions for optimality are obtained through application of the calculus of variations and the distributed weak minimum principle. A gradient method is used for the computation of optimal injection policies. The performance of the algorithm was examined for the surfactant injection in a one-dimensional flooding problem. The results of this work show that given the properties of an oil reservoir and the properties of a surfactant solution, an optimum injection policy which minimizes a specific economic objective functional can be obtained using distributed parameter control theory.