ABSTRACT
Most of the synthetic surfactants investigated with the aim of enhanced chemically oil recovery in the literature have environmental drawbacks. In this work, application of an environmentally-friendly synthetic surfactant as an enhanced oil recovery agent is introduced by measuring interfacial tension of water–kerosene systems and wettability alteration of carbonate pellets. For this purpose, an amino acid-based surfactant was initially synthesized using a new synthetic approach which was subsequently confirmed by spectra of Fourier transform infrared and Proton nuclear magnetic resonance. Results showed a value of critical micelle concentration in the range of 9000–9100 ppm for this surfactant. Results also demonstrated a decrease of 38.53% in water–kerosene system interfacial tension and a 17.76% reduction in oil-wetness of the carbonate pellets.