Density -Temperature Correlation of Crude Oil
Abdur Rehman1 . Ahmad Hussain2 . Raheel Shahbaz3 . Huzaifa Khan4 .Abid Hussain5
Abstract
Density is an important property of crude
oil.However no practical theory exist for
calculation of this property at elevated
temperature.The principle objective of this
paper is to derive a correlation of
temperature-density of crude oil and compare
our result with standard density-Temperature
predicting correlations.
Introduction
The knowledge of rheological properties like
density of crude oil play an important role in
determining the production from a
reservoir.Crude oil is naturally occurring
viscous liquid which is a complex mixture of
hydrocarbon and hetroatomic molecules.And
Crude oil exhibits wide variations in
composition and the properties and these
occur not only in crude oil from different
fields but also in oil taken from different
production depths in the same well. Density
is often described as amount of matter
available in a particular volume.And density
depends on two other properties pressure and
temperature. According to history, physical
properties like boiling point, viscosity,odour
and density specific gravity have been used
to describe oils .On the basis of density crude
oil-water mixture is important in petroleum
industry in order to optimize the process
parameters of proper design of pipes and
pumping of petroleum and is often classified
as light or live oil and heavy or dead oil. As
live oil has dissolved gas in it and dead oil has
zero solution-gas oil ratio and it is thicker
and more viscous than live oil. Density play
very important role in oil
production,transportation through pipelines
and oil recovery processes obtaining reliable
density measurements can be difficult
,especially for live oil. And liquids tend to
expand when their temperature increases so
increasing temperature decreases density.
Density is an important property that helps in
numerical simulations used to determine the
economics of EOR project. And also predicts
the success of failure of an EOR project.
Consequently a correlation must estimate
these values under different temperature (K,
1995)This property is very important and
should be evaluated precisely for reservoir
simulation. The sample was taken from
Rajian oil field (located in the Gujar Khan
near Islamabad. Currently there are four
producing heavy oil wells under Company’s
acreage. The field was discovered and came
on regular production in August 1994.).And
the effect of temperature on density was
studied thoroughly.And density varies with
temperature for different crude oils have been
studied by different reseachers like
(Alomair1, 2015) at al.And literature shows
that with increasing of temperature the
density of crude oil goes on decreasing. And
they showed that an inverse relation is
applicable for density and temperature.In our
research we worked on the work of osama’s
work in which he took Samples from 30
crude oil of different API and compared them
with standard corelations of different
researchers.In our work we will disscuss the
osama’s work and compare our work with
osama’s work and a correlation is developed
which reduces the errors between
experimental and predicted data.Our
temperature range was 0 to 70C, due to
certain limitations,which is not the most
common range of operation in reservoirs.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
Sample Preparation
The samples which were taken from the
crude oil from Rajian oil field were collected
in 1.5L bottles at room temperature prior to
the experiment shake the bottle vigorously so
as to achieve homogeneity. Just before
experiment the crude oil from the bottle is
taken into 250ml graduated beaker before
each test instruments should be calibrated to
reduce errors.
Methods
1.Mud balance 2.Density
and specific gravity meter
3.Hydrometer
Density and specific gravity meter.
Its works on the principle of oscillations.it is
the time taken by of the molecules of liquid
as they passes from one end of the test cell to
the other.firstly.Sampling (we will set the
temperature at which the density of the crude
oil is to be evaluated).Drainage (in this mode
the instrument will separate the impurities
from the oil.Rinse/Rinse2 (low viscosity
liquid is introduced into the instrument which
removes any left over impurities).Purging (in
this method silica gel is used to absorb the
moisture from the apparatus.
Density model evaluation
Fluid densities have been estimated using
Standing (MB, 1957) method, with n
correction factors. The correction factor Dqp
is the change in density due to the effect of
pressure on the oil, and DqT is the change in
density due to the thermal expansion of oils
as described in Eq. 8 (Sattarin M, 2007)
Results and Discussion
A lot of work has
been done to predict density at normal and
elevated temperatures.We took the osama’s
work and created a model for predicting
densities at different temperatures. So our
goal was to create models in the following
formats for the density predictions
𝛒 = 𝒇(𝑻)
Where ρ is the density of crude oil in
kg/m3,where T is the temperature in Celsius.
The purpose was to develop a unified model
of a set of parameters for the entire range of
crude oil density with only one equation.
Curve fitting by regression methods of the
experimental density data with respect to
temperature was applied. The results were
acceptable and well fit by an equation of the
following form:
ρ = a(T) + b
where a and b are constants which vary from
oil to oil due to composition differences
where a=-0.0017 and b=0.8241
Following is the data of of the Rajian crude
oil at different temperatures:
Temp Density
9 0.81527
18 0.81141
27 0.80316
36 0.79553
45 0.78788
54 0.78267
 63 0.77297 dead oil samples under normal pressure. The
: reliability and accuracy of the data from the
density measurements were checked by
Now we plot the given data on the graph to comparing the experimental values with the
generate its regression coefficient R²,Which predicted values using standing density
is calculated as R2=0.99 model.The density according to standing
model is as given

temperature Density
9 0.81517
18 0.81131
27 0.80300
36 0.79513
45 0.78728
54 0.78206
. 63 0.77216
Fluid densities have been estimated using
Standing (MB, 1957) method, with an
correction factors. The correction factor Dpp
is the change in density due to the effect of
pressure on the oil, and Dpt is the change in
density due to the thermal expansion of oils
as described in Eq. below. (Sattarin M, 2007)

Now we compare the experimental value

and the predicted value from the standing
equation.

where P is the pressure in bar, T is the Density(standing

temperature in Rankin, and psc is the Density method)
measured density at standard conditions kg 0.81527 0.81517
m-3. 0.81141 0.81131
The pressure correction factor was neglected 0.80316 0.80300
because all the measurements were done on 0.79553 0.79513
 0.78788 0.78728 model describes the data with some minor
0.78267 0.78206 scattering points around the (y = x) line while
0.77297 0.77216 the proposed model is giving the best
0.76479 0.76400 prediction without any scattering between the
experimental data and the model’s measured
density value.
0.82
Experimental density

0.81
0.8
0.79
R²
LABEDI 1992 0.19
0.78 STANDING 1947 0.61
NASERI, NIKAZAR… 0.74
0.77
BEGGS AND… 0.76
0.76 PETROSKY… 0.79
0.76 0.78 0.8 0.82 GASLO 1980 0.87
Standing Density KARTOATMODJ… 0.88
ELSHARKAWY AND… 0.89
HOSSAIN SARICA… 0.91
STANDING 1947 0.95
OSAMA'S WORK… 0.97
Approach: squaring the Pearson product THIS WORK 2019 0.99
moment correlation coefficient graph is a bar 0 0.5 1 1.5
chart showing the measured values of the
linear regression correlation coefficient, R2,
for all the models. This chart shows the R2
value of the proposed model with the 11 Conclusion
tested models. The proposed model has the
Although, oils of widely varying
highest R2 value (0.99), followed by the
compositions can have the same gravity,
model proposed by Osama (0.97). Two other
considerable errors may be introduced when
models by Hosain et al. and Elsharkawy and
the densities of heavy oils are estimated from
Alikhan (1999) have correlation coefficients
general density trends and the API
of (0.91) and (0.89), respectively. The lowest
gravity.Good results of the proposed density
R2 value, 0.19, is for the model by Labedi
model at elevated temperatures could be
(1992).The graphical approach in Fig. 7
observed with the coefficient of
shows the behavior of all the tested models
determination R2 of 0.99. Several empirical
against the experimental and calculated
models for estimating the density of dead oils
values. Some models present a relatively high
were evaluated by osama alhomair using
value of R2, but some of these models are
density data of heavy crude oils from the
inconsistent with real values around the line,
reservoirs of Middle East.We compared our
specifically the models of (Naseri et al. 2005)
work with the work of osama and we reach to
and (Kartoatmodjo and Schmidt 1994). Other
the conclusion that the assessment of the
models, such as (Beal 1946) and (Labedi
agreement between the experimental density
1992), have low R2 values, and the predicted
data and the predicted values indicates that
data are scattered (Fig. 7). This graphical
the proposed model successfully represents
presentation also shows that the Standing
the experimental data with the coefficients of
determination R2 of 0.99.However, this new
model is easy to use, provides fair accuracy
and precision over a wide range of heavy oil
gravities, and could be used to predict better
outcomes in future works.
Acknowledgments
This work was supported by University of
Engineeering and Technology Lahore
Pakistan.The authors would also like to
acknowledge Osama’s work from where
some of the data were used.
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