Using water-miscible nonionic hydrophobic monomer associating HPAM as drag reducing agent

A water-miscible nonionic surfmer (AC-TX100) was synthesized based on Triton X-100 and acryloyl chloride. Then, a terpolymer P(AM/AA/AC-TX100) was synthesized by free radical polymerization in aqueous solution and intended to be used as drag reducing agent (DRA). The DRA was defined to be P(AM 87.32 /AA 12.46 /AC-TX100 0.22 ) according to 1 H NMR and elemental analysis, the molecular weight was 2.12 × 10 6 g/mol according to scattering method. DRA shows excellent performance in drag reduction (DR). The highest DR rate of 76% can be obtained when DRA concentration is 0.023% in fresh water; while in brine containing 3% NaCl, DR rate decreases, and it is necessary to increase the concentration to 0.05% to ensure that DR rate is higher than 70%. SEM and cryo-TEM show that DRA forms a network structure in aqueous solution, and the tightness of this structure has a direct influence on DR performance. Specifically, DRA molecules stretch into the whirlpools generated by water at high flow rates, reducing the quantity and intensity of whirlpools, thereby lowering the energy loss and the friction. © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2019 , 136 , 48362.