Crude Oil Exploration and Production

Crude Oil Production Equipments

Casing Strings- Casing string is a connected series of steel pipes which runs through the wellbore fromwellheadto the oil reservoir. Sections of pipe are connected with each other using couplings, to suit a particular wellbore. Normally length of a typical pipe section is 40ft or 12m. These sections are male threaded on both ends are connected to each other by couplings which are female threaded on both ends.

Production Tubing- Production tubing passes through the wellbore up to the reservoir and is responsible for transporting the reservoir fluids to surface. While selecting production tubing, the wellbore geometry, properties of reservoir fluids and production characteristics of the concerned reservoir have to be considered. Production tubing along with other completion components such as casing makes up the production string.

Riser- Riser is a pipe which connects an offshore oil well to the associated drilling platform. A riser runs up starting from the seabed up to the drilling platform. Based on the whether thewellheadand Blow Out Preventer (BOP) are located on the seabed or on the drilling platform, the associated riser can be classified in following two types.

Slug Catcher- Slug catcher is a static equipment used in theupstream oil production facilitiesto minimize the slug from oil and gas pipeline. Fluids extracted from oil and gas reservoirs contain crude oil, natural gas, water, salts etc. The multiphase flow in a pipeline often leads to formation of slug flow. This multiphase flow is received in a large vessel in the crude oil processing and storage facilities where the oil, water and gases are crudely separated to remove the slug, hence the name.

Well Completion- A well completion for oil production of wells, refers to the assembly of tubulars, packers, and other tools installed beneath thewellheadin the productioncasing. A well completion provides means for separation of different zones, by separating the tools and equipments that provides control and safety of two different flow paths.

Wellhead- Wellhead consists of components of an oil well which are located above the surface. Wellhead acts as an interface between the casing strings in oil wellbore and surface facilities. Well head provides suspending point for thecasing stringsrunning through the wellbore and also acts to contain the pressure inside thecasing strings.

Multiphase Flow Meter (MPFM)——一个多相流量计用于测量flowrates of produced crude oil, water and gas phases from an oil production well. A multiphase flowmeter can be thought of as a scaled down assembly of test separator and corresponding flow meters.

Crude Oil Production Instrumentation

Choke valves- Choke valve is a type of control valves, mostly used in oil and gas production wells to control the flow of well fluids being produced. Another purpose that the choke valves serve is to kill the pressure from reservoir and to regulate the downstream pressure in the flowlines. Typically oil and gas producing wells have two choke valves in series, one non-regulating choke valve and one regulating choke valve downstream to the non-regulating choke valve.

Gas lift valves- Gas lift valves are used in a gas-lift system to control the flow of lift gas from annulus around the production tubing to the production tubing. The gas lift valves are located in the gas lift mandrel. Gas lift mandrel provides communication with the lift gas supply in the tubing annulus.

Subsurface Safety Valves (SSSV)- To protect the surface facilities in case of emergency, the wellbore is isolated from surface facilities using a subsurface safety valve (SSSV). Hence such a safety valve needs to be fail safe in order to isolate well bore in any kind of system failure or damage to surface production, control and safety facilities.

Crude Oil Extraction Process

Gas Lift for Oil Wells- Gas lift is an artificial-lift method for enhancing crude oil recovery from a reservoir. The gas injected in the oil column reduces the effective density of oil inproduction tubing, thus reducing the hydrostatic pressure of the oil column in the well. The reduced pressure of the oil column above the reservoir allows the reservoir fluids to enter the oil well bore at a higher flow rate. Gas lift can be either continuous or intermittent, depending on the productivity of the concerned wells.

Terminology

Gas to Oil Ration (GOR)-Gas to Oil Ratio (GOR) is a commonly used term in the crude oil exploration and production industry. GOR is the ratio of volumetric flow of produced gas to the volumetric flow of crude oil for crude oil and gas mixture sample.

Productivity Index for Oil Wells- With reference to the oil and gas production wells, the term ‘Productivity Index’ is an indicator of ability of the reservoir to produce fluid flow in relation to the reservoir pressure. The productivity index can be mathematically expressed as the ratio of volumetric flow produced by a well (bbl/day) to the pressure loss between reservoir and bottomhole (psi). PI = Q/(P_R– P_BH) bbl/day/psi

Water Cut——含水原油质量指的是塞ntage of water in all the liquids, i.e. crude oil plus water. Water cut is an important parameter along with the ‘Gas to Oil Ratio’ (GOR) of a crude oil to clearly indicate the water content in reservoir fluids.