Today, oil recovery is still an important source of energy for the world economy, despite the exploration of alternative and environment-friendly sources. Looming shortages and awareness of possible collateral damage have led to intensive enhanced oil recovery studies to predict actual behavior.
Lab-on-a-chip technology makes it possible to study thermal, chemical and microbial enhanced oil recovery. By creating surrogate rock pore structures on a chip, it is possible to measure the effectiveness and possible side-effects of enhanced oil recovery. These surrogate structures provide a full visualisation of the flow and make real-time analysis possible. This way it is possible to characterise and predict the flow inside sedimentary rock structures.