Technology Focus: Artificial Lift (October 2021)

2021 ◽  
Vol 73 (10) ◽  
pp. 53-53
Author(s):  
Michael C. Romer

What, a second artificial lift focus feature this year? What’s going on? Well, maybe I can answer your questions with another round of questions: Do you know how many of your organization’s wells are artificially lifted? Or, more importantly, do you know what fraction of your production volumes are dependent on artificial lift? I would wager that the percentages are higher than you would expect, and I encourage you to seek out that information and share it. Share it with your asset team, share it with other asset teams, share it with other functions, share it with your management, shout it from the rooftops! Seriously, though, this information can be quite useful to you and your organization. Did you ever wonder if someone else could be struggling with the same artificial lift selection, installation, operation, or reliability challenges that you are? The answer you’re looking for may be in the SPE archives, or it may be just down the road with a colleague in a different part of the region, country, or world. Do you have a novel new technique, system, or invention that you want to try out? Why not leverage the knowledge that others in your company could also benefit from? Maybe they would even like to participate and strengthen your pilot with a broader range of test conditions. Do you need more personnel or technical or financial support for artificial lift in your asset? Show precisely what those electrical submersible pumps (ESPs), rod pumps, gas-lift valves, and plungers (among others) are lifting to the flowline. Sometimes a step back to a higher-level view can motivate and reinforce the people behind the day-to-day efforts to extend the time between failures and chase optimum performance. I’m certain that you are now a (possibly unwilling) expert at videoconferencing. That’s why I would like to encourage you to attend the 2021 SPE Electric Submersible Pumps Symposium, to be held 4–8 October in The Woodlands, Texas. Of course, the technical presentations will be well worth it, but you may gain even more value from the networking, collaboration, and idea generation that happens between the events listed in the program. Not an ESP person? Do gas and sand separators, power cables, advanced materials, and downhole sensors apply to other lift methods or well systems in general? How about applied artificial intelligence, reliability studies, and predictive analytics? Maybe they don’t for you right now, but they could. I hope to see you there. Recommended additional reading at OnePetro: www.onepetro.org. SPE 201153 - Intermittent Gas Lift for Liquid-Loaded Horizontal Wells in Tight Gas Shale Reservoirs by Daniel David Croce, Colorado School of Mines SPE 202668 - Insert Sucker Rod Surface-Controlled Subsurface Safety Valve: A Step Ahead To Improve the Well Integrity for Sucker Rod Artificial Lift Retrofitting by Salvatore Pilone, Eni, et al. SPE 201136 - New Stage of Rodless Artificial Lift Operation: The First Field Application of Submersible Motor Cable Plug With Electric Submersible Progressing Cavity Pump in CNPC by Shijia Zhu, China National Petroleum Corporation, et al.

PETRO ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 8
Author(s):  
Jonathan Jonathan ◽  
Sisworini Sisworini ◽  
Samsol Samsol ◽  
Hari Oetomo

<em>In the world of oil is very common in the production system. This production system produces oil from wells after drilling and well compressions. Over time, the production of a well may decrease due to several parameters of pressure drop and the presence of clay which makes the pipe diameter narrower. There are several methods used to increase the decrease in production including adding artificial lifts such as sucker rod pump, electric submersible pump and gas lift, reservoir stimulation and pipe cleaning if the pipe diameter is reduced due to clay. The well has been installed an artificial lift is a gas lift and this well need an optimization to increase its production. The EC-6 well optimization is planned by comparing the lift-up scenario of the gas lift by adjusting the rate of gas injection and deepening the orifice injection and also an installation of electrical submersible pump. Best percentage of optimization production from EC-6 Well, last scenario is chosen which is new installation artificial lift ESP from gas lift (existing) and gaining 18.52% form existing production</em>


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ahmed Alshmakhy ◽  
Khadija Al Daghar ◽  
Sameer Punnapala ◽  
Shamma AlShehhi ◽  
Abdel Ben Amara ◽  
...  

Author(s):  
Sherif Fakher ◽  
Abdelaziz Khlaifat ◽  
M. Enamul Hossain ◽  
Hashim Nameer

AbstractIn many oil reservoirs worldwide, the downhole pressure does not have the ability to lift the produced fluids to the surface. In order to produce these fluids, pumps are used to artificially lift the fluids; this method is referred to as artificial lift. More than seventy percent of all currently producing oil wells are being produced by artificial lift methods. One of the most applied artificial lift methods is sucker rod pump. Sucker rod pumps are considered a well-established technology in the oil and gas industry and thus are easy to apply, very common worldwide, and low in capital and operational costs. Many advancements in technology have been applied to improve sucker rod pumps performance, applicability range, and diagnostics. With these advancements, it is important to be able to constantly provide an updated review and guide to the utilization of the sucker rod pumps. This research provides an updated comprehensive review of sucker rod pumps components, diagnostics methods, mathematical models, and common failures experienced in the field and how to prevent and mitigate these failures. Based on the review conducted, a new classification of all the methods that can fall under the sucker rod pump technology based on newly introduced sucker rod pump methods in the industry has been introduced. Several field cases studies from wells worldwide are also discussed in this research to highlight some of the main features of sucker rod pumps. Finally, the advantages and limitations of sucker rod pumps are mentioned based on the updated review. The findings of this study can help increase the understanding of the different sucker rod pumps and provide a holistic view of the beam rod pump and its properties and modeling.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammed Ahmed Al-Janabi ◽  
Omar F. Al-Fatlawi ◽  
Dhifaf J. Sadiq ◽  
Haider Abdulmuhsin Mahmood ◽  
Mustafa Alaulddin Al-Juboori

Abstract Artificial lift techniques are a highly effective solution to aid the deterioration of the production especially for mature oil fields, gas lift is one of the oldest and most applied artificial lift methods especially for large oil fields, the gas that is required for injection is quite scarce and expensive resource, optimally allocating the injection rate in each well is a high importance task and not easily applicable. Conventional methods faced some major problems in solving this problem in a network with large number of wells, multi-constrains, multi-objectives, and limited amount of gas. This paper focuses on utilizing the Genetic Algorithm (GA) as a gas lift optimization algorithm to tackle the challenging task of optimally allocating the gas lift injection rate through numerical modeling and simulation studies to maximize the oil production of a Middle Eastern oil field with 20 production wells with limited amount of gas to be injected. The key objective of this study is to assess the performance of the wells of the field after applying gas lift as an artificial lift method and applying the genetic algorithm as an optimization algorithm while comparing the results of the network to the case of artificially lifted wells by utilizing ESP pumps to the network and to have a more accurate view on the practicability of applying the gas lift optimization technique. The comparison is based on different measures and sensitivity studies, reservoir pressure, and water cut sensitivity analysis are applied to allow the assessment of the performance of the wells in the network throughout the life of the field. To have a full and insight view an economic study and comparison was applied in this study to estimate the benefits of applying the gas lift method and the GA optimization technique while comparing the results to the case of the ESP pumps and the case of naturally flowing wells. The gas lift technique proved to have the ability to enhance the production of the oil field and the optimization process showed quite an enhancement in the task of maximizing the oil production rate while using the same amount of gas to be injected in the each well, the sensitivity analysis showed that the gas lift method is comparable to the other artificial lift method and it have an upper hand in handling the reservoir pressure reduction, and economically CAPEX of the gas lift were calculated to be able to assess the time to reach a profitable income by comparing the results of OPEX of gas lift the technique showed a profitable income higher than the cases of naturally flowing wells and the ESP pumps lifted wells. Additionally, the paper illustrated the genetic algorithm (GA) optimization model in a way that allowed it to be followed as a guide for the task of optimizing the gas injection rate for a network with a large number of wells and limited amount of gas to be injected.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohd Hafizi Ariffin ◽  
Muhammad Idraki M Khalil ◽  
Abdullah M Razali ◽  
M Iman Mostaffa

Abstract Most of the oil fields in Sarawak has already producing more than 30 years. When the fields are this old, the team is most certainly facing a lot of problems with aging equipment and facilities. Furthermore, the initial stage of platform installation was not designed to accommodate a large space for an artificial lift system. Most of these fields were designed with gas lift compressors, but because of the space limitation, the platforms can only accommodate a limited gas lift compressor capacity due to space constraints. Furthermore, in recent years, some of the fields just started with their secondary recovery i.e. water, gas injection where the fluid gradient became heavier due to GOR drop or water cut increases. With these limitations and issues, the team needs to be creative in order to prolong the fields’ life with various artificial lift. In order to push the limits, the team begins to improve gas lift distribution among gas lifted wells in the field. This is the cheapest option. Network model recommends the best distribution for each gas lifted wells. Gas lifted wells performance highly dependent on fluid weight, compressor pressure, and reservoir pressure. The change of these parameters will impact the production of these wells. Rigorous and prudent data acquisitions are important to predict performance. Some fields are equipped with pressure downhole gauges, wellhead pressure transmitters, and compressor pressure transmitters. The data collected is continuous and good enough to be used for analysis. Instead of depending on compressor capacity, a high-pressure gas well is a good option for gas lift supply. The issues are to find gas well with enough pressure and sustainability. Usually, this was done by sacrificing several barrels of oil to extract the gas. Electrical Submersible Pump (ESP) is a more expensive option compared to a gas lift method. The reason is most of these fields are not designed to accommodate ESP electricity and space requirements. Some equipment needs to be improved before ESP installation. Because of this, the team were considering new technology such as Thru Tubing Electrical Submersible Pump (TTESP) for a cheaper option. With the study and implementation as per above, the fields able to prolong its production until the end of Production Sharing Contract (PSC). This proactive approach has maintained the fields’ production with The paper seeks to present on the challenges, root cause analysis and the lessons learned from the subsequent improvement activities. The lessons learned will be applicable to oil fields with similar situations to further improve the fields’ production.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 75
Author(s):  
Harry Budiharjo Sulistyarso ◽  
KRT Nur Suhascaryo ◽  
Mochamad Jalal Abdul Goni

The MRA platform is one of the offshore platforms located in the north of the Java Sea. The MRA platform has 4 production wells, namely MRA-2ST, MRA-4ST, MRA-5, and MRA-6 wells. The 4 production wells are produced using an artificial lift in the form of a gas lift. The limited gas lift at the MRA Platform at 3.1 MMSCFD makes the production of wells at the MRA Platform not optimal because the wells in the MRA Platform are experiencing insufficient gas lift. Optimization of gas lift injection is obtained by redistribution of gas lift injection for each. The results of the analysis in this study indicate that the optimum gas lift injection for the MRA-2ST well is 0.5552 MMSCFD, the MRA-6 well is 1.0445 MMSCFD, the MRA-5 well is 0.7657 MMSCFD, finally the MRA-4ST well with gas injection. lift is 0.7346 MMSCFD. The manual gas lift in the MRA-4ST is also replaced based on an economic feasibility analysis to ensure that the gas lift injection for each well can be kept constant. The redistribution of gas lift carried out by the author has increased the total production rate of the MRA Platform by 11,160 BO/year or approximately USD 781,200/year. Keywords: Gas lift; Insufficient; Optimization


2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 32
Author(s):  
Mia Ferian Helmy

Gas lift is one of the artificial lift method that has mechanism to decrease the flowing pressure gradient in the pipe or relieving the fluid column inside the tubing by injecting amount of gas into the annulus between casing and tubing. The volume of  injected gas was inversely proportional to decreasing of  flowing  pressure gradient, the more volume of gas injected the smaller the pressure gradient. Increasing flowrate is expected by decreasing pressure gradient, but it does not always obtained when the well is in optimum condition. The increasing of flow rate will not occured even though the volume of injected gas is abundant. Therefore, the precisely design of gas lift included amount of cycle, gas injection volume and oil recovery estimation is needed. At the begining well AB-1 using artificial lift method that was continuos gas lift with PI value assumption about 0.5 STB/D/psi. Along with decreasing of production flow rate dan availability of the gas injection in brownfield, so this well must be analyze to determined the appropriate production method under current well condition. There are two types of gas lift method, continuous and intermittent gas lift. Each type of gas lift has different optimal condition to increase the production rate. The optimum conditions of continuous gaslift are high productivity 0.5 STB/D/psi and minimum production rate 100 BFPD. Otherwise, the intermittent gas lift has limitations PI and production rate which is lower than continuous gas lift.The results of the analysis are Well AB-1 has production rate gain amount 20.75 BFPD from 23 BFPD became 43.75 BFPD with injected gas volume 200 MSCFPD and total cycle 13 cycle/day. This intermittent gas lift design affected gas injection volume efficiency amount 32%.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luiz Pastre ◽  
Jorge Biazussi ◽  
William Monte Verde ◽  
Antonio Bannwart

Abstract Although being widely used as an artificial lift method for heavy oil field developments, Electrical Submersible Pump (ESP) performance in high viscous applications is not fully understood. In order to improve knowledge of pump behavior under such conditions, Equinor has developed stage qualification tests as part of the technical requirements for deploying ESPs in Peregrino Field located offshore Brazil and has funded a series of research efforts to better design and operate the system more efficiently. Qualification tests were made mandatory for every stage type prior to field deployment in Peregrino. It is known that the affinity laws don´t hold true for high viscosity applications. Therefore, extensive qualification tests are required to provide actual stage performance in high viscous applications. Test results are used to optimize ESP system design for each well selecting the most efficient stage type considering specific well application challenges. In addition, the actual pump performance improves accuracy in production allocation algorithms. A better understanding of ESP behavior in viscous fluid application helps improving oil production and allows ESP operation with higher efficiency, increasing system run life. Shear forces inside ESP stages generate emulsion that compromises ESP performance. Lab tests in controlled environments have helped Equinor to gather valuable information about emulsion formation and evaluate ESP performance in conditions similar to field application. Equinor has funded studies to better understand two-phase flow (oil-water) which allowed visualization and investigation of oil drops dynamics inside the impeller. In addition, experimental procedures were proposed to investigate the effective viscosity of emulsion at pump discharge and the phase inversion hysteresis in the transition water-oil and oil-water emulsion. In addition to qualification tests and research performed to better understand system behavior, Equinor has developed and improved procedures to operate ESP systems in high viscous applications with emulsion production during 10 years of operation in Peregrino field. Such conditions also impose challenges to ESP system reliability. Over the years, Equinor has peformed failure analysis to enhance ESP system robustness which, combined with upper completion design, have improved system operation and reliability decreasing operating costs in Peregrino field.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kuswanto Kuswanto ◽  
Oka Fabian ◽  
Orient B Samuel ◽  
Mohd Yuzmanizeil B Yaakub ◽  
Chua Hing Leong ◽  
...  

Abstract The B Field is located in the South China Sea, about 45 KM offshore Sarawak, Malaysia, in a water depth approximately 230 ft. Its structure is generally regarded as a gentle rollover anticline with collapsed crest resulting from growth faulting. The reservoirs were deposited in a coastal to shallow marine with some channels observed. Multiple stacked reservoirs consist of a series of very thick stacked alternating sandstone and minor shale layers with differing reservoir properties. The shallow zones are unconsolidated, and the wells were completed with internal gravel packs. Wells in B Field mostly were completed in multi-layered reservoirs as dual strings with SSDs and meant to produce as a commingled production. The well BX is located within B Field and designed as oil producer well with a conventional tubing jointedElectrical Submersible Pump (ESP) system which was installed back in 2008. Refer to figure 1, the initial completion schematic is 3-1/2″ single string that consist of the single production packer, gas lift mandrel, tubing retrievable Surface Controlled Subsurface Safety Valve (SCSSV) and ESP. The production packers equipped with the feed thru design to accommodate the ESP cable and the gas vent valve as part of the ESP completion design. The gas lift mandrel was installed in the completion string as a backup artificial lift method to receive the gas lift and orifice valve in the event of the conventional ESP failed. Hence the well still able to produce by introducing the gas thru the annulus to activate the gas lift valve. Eventually throughout the end of the the field life, the well would depend on the ESP system for the primary lifting method due to gas lift depth limitation and the gas supply. The conventional ESP failed after seven years of operation which is above the average ESP lifetime. The well last produced at a flow rate with 28 % water cut, however the well is not at the end of the field life. Based on the economical study with the right technology and cost efficient approach, the well still economicaly profitable. The Thru Tubing (TT) ESP technology is approached as cost effective solution compare to fully well workover. Despite a couple of operational challenges, for example, setting the cable hanger, maintaining downhole barrier requirement, the Thru Tubing Electrical Submersible Pump Cable Deployed (TTESP CD) and Cable Thru Insert Safety Valve (CT-ISV) was successfully installed. Several post-installation findings have uncovered some problems which are requiring some additional technical and operation improvement for future similar applications. This paper will highlight the deployment of the Cable Thru Insert Safety Valve (CT-ISV) that was successfully installed as pilot, which is the first application in the world, and also highlights the success, lesson learnt and improvement for future requirement for the CT-ISV application as one of the solution for retrofitting completion application without jeopardizing the well integrity. This achievement is collaboration between Company and service partner as the technology and deployment under the proprietary scope. Further technology application, the replication of this insert safety valve was conducted and successfully deployed on other three wells.


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