Amphiphilic acrylamide copolymers using polymerizable tweens for potential use in chemical-enhanced oil recovery

In this work, nine amphiphilic acrylamide copolymers were synthesized using three surface-active co-monomers based on polyethoxylated sorbitan monoesters. The prepared co-monomers and copolymers were characterized by FT-IR, ¹H-NMR, and viscosity average molecular weight. Surface/interfacial activities, contact angles, and rheological properties for aqueous solutions of the prepared copolymers were determined. Also, the influence of salts' concentration and temperature variation was investigated. The results showed that incorporating the prepared co-monomers into the copolymers backbone enhanced their properties and capabilities. This improvement was enlarged by increasing the feed ratio and chain length of the attached co-monomers. The copolymers PT20S-3, PT40S-3, and PT60S-3 showed better results and the latter exhibited the best values. They were 37.6 mN.m⁻¹, 6.4 mN.m⁻¹, 15.678° and 338.48 mPa.s for γ_ST, γ_IFT, CA, and η_app respectively. The copolymer PT60S-3 was expected to have a prospective use as a chemical EOR agent.