Integrated a Fused Silica Capillary Cell and In Situ Raman Spectroscopy for Determining the Solubility of CO2 in n-Decane and n-Decane

Understanding the solubility of CO2 is critical for implementing CO2-enhanced oil recovery (CO2-EOR). In this work, the solubility of CO2 in n-decane in a temperature range between 303.15 K and 353.15 K and pressures up to 15 MPa was measured using a fused silica capillary cell with in situ Raman spectroscopy. A semi-empirical CO2 solubility prediction model was obtained according to the experimental results. In order to improve the solubility of CO2 in n-decane, the solubility of CO2 in n-decane and co-solvent n-hexane (3% wt) mixture was also comparatively investigated. The results indicated that the solubility of CO2 in n-decane was 1.6355 similar to 64.0084 mol/kg. The data from the prediction model were in good agreement with the experimental data, and the mean relative deviation was 3.65%, indicating that the prediction model could be used to predict the solubility of CO2 in n-decane under different conditions. The solubility of CO2 in n-decane + n-hexane system ranged from 1.0127 mol/kg to 65.7286 mol/kg. It was found that, under low-pressure conditions, the addition of co-solvent n-hexane did not enhance the solubility of CO2, while it had a certain enhancement effect on the dissolution of CO2 under high-pressure conditions. As the temperature increased from 303.15 K to 353.15 K, the enhancement efficiency of the solubility of CO2 also increased from 1.34 similar to 2.05% to 8.17 similar to 9.82%, and the average enhancement efficiency increased from 1.74% to 9.00%. This study provides more CO2 solubility data for CO2-EOR.