Non-symmetric distributions of solids deposition for solid-water stratified flow in deviated tubing strings

Dynamic performance on solids flow with water in deviated tubing is essential for the reliability of pump and normal operation of horizontal and directional wells.Compared with coal-water flow in vertical tubing and sand-oil flow with high production in deviated tubing,solids deposition with water shows obvious non-symmetric distributions in deviated tubing from simulations and experiments.The mathematical model of two phase flow was developed under coupling conditions of deviated tubing,low flow rate and viscosity based on the kinetic theory of granular flow and first-order discrete scheme.The results show that solid-water stratified flow in deviated tubing can be divided into two zones of suspension bed and the moving bed throughout the flow field.The solid flowing velocity with water is negative and particles slide down at the bottom of moving bed zone.The process of solids flow with water in deviated tubing will produce pressure loss and consume the kinetic energy.The thickness of deposited layer and the flowing velocity of solids flow downward with water at the moving bed zone enhance with the decreased inlet flow rate and the increased particle size,tubing inside diameter(ID)and inclination angle.Solids are easier into suspension from the upper part of moving bed zone to suspension bed zone and more solid particles flow with water towards the tubing outlet with the increase of inlet flowing velocity.The decision is made to reduce the screen width,tubing ID and inclination angle to maintain to be greater than critical deposition velocity in order to prevent solids settling.And it provides the theoretical basis and technical reserves for solid control and offers an effective approach to enhance tubing cleaning in deviated strings.

Gas-water stratified flow patterns from electromagnetic tomography

Because of gravitational differentiation of multi-phase fluids, gas-water flow is usually stratified in highly inclined or horizontal gas wells. By using electrode arrays to scan flowing fluids, electromagnetic tomography can identify the flow patterns of mixed fluid from the different electrical properties of gas and water. The responses for different gas-water interface locations were calculated and then physical measurements were undertaken. We compared the results of the numerical simulation with the experimental data, and found that the response characteristics were consistent in the circumstances of uniform physical fields and stratified flows. By analyzing the signal characteristics, it is found that, with the change of the interface location, the response curves showed ＂steps＂ whose position and width were decided by the location of fluid interface. The measurement accuracy of this method depended on the vertical distance between adjacent electrodes. The results showed that computer simulation can simulate the measurement of the electromagnetic tomography accurately, so the physical experiment can be replaced.

Interfacial Shear Stress of Stratified Flow in a Horizontal Pipe

Experimental data are presented for the void fraction and the shear stresses of stratified gas-liquid flow in a pipe. A new technique was used to measure the interface shear stress. The interfacial shear stress was determined by using two methods: a momentum balance of gas and an extrapolation of the Reynolds shear stress profile at the gas-liquid interface. A new formula , relating to the interfacial friction factor with the void fraction and superficial gas Reynold number, was developed to predict the interface shear stress . The predicted values are in good agreement with experimental data.

A Model for Predicting Holdup and Pressure Drop in Gas- Liquid Stratified Flow

The time-dependent liquid film thickness and pressure drop were measured by using parallel-wire conductance probes and capacitance differential-pressure transducers. Applying the eddy viscosity theory and an appropriate correlation of interfacial sear stress,a new two-dimensional separated model of holdup and pressure drop of turbulent/turbulent gas-liquid stratified flow was presented. Prediction results agreed well with experimental data.

Lie Point Symmetry Algebras and Finite Transformation Groups of Baroclinic Mode for Rotating Stratified Flows

The transformation groups and symmetries of the baroclinic mode for rotating stratified flow can be obtained via the standard approach. Applying the symmetry group on some special solutions, the newly obtained results disprove a known conjecture.

A Model of Turbulent-Laminar Gas-Liquid Stratified Flow

The time-dependent liquid film thickness and pressure drop are measured by using parallel-wire conduc tance probes and capacitance differential-pressure transducer. A mathematical model with iterative procedure to calculate holdup and pressure drop in horizontal and inclined gas-liquid stratified flow is developed. The predictions agree well with over a hundred experimental data in 0.024 and 0.04 m diameter pipelines.

Wax deposition modeling in oil-water stratified pipe flow

Wax deposition in oil-water stratified flow is commonly encountered onshore and offshore oil production pipe systems,and typically reduces transportation capacity of oil.The accurate predicted model of wax deposition has becomes an indispensable approach to design effective remediation strategies.However,a reliable mechanistic model for wax deposition prediction in oil-water two-phase stratified pipe flow is lacking to validate the deposition process.In this work,a three-dimensional(axial,radial,and angular)robust wax deposit model for oil-water stratified circular pipe flow was developed.The model of formation of a gel deposit based on the first principles of rheology was developed,associated with the results obtained from hydrodynamics and heat/mass transfer simulations.The predictions for wax deposition are found to compare satisfactorily with experimental data with two different oils for single phase and four different water cuts for oil-water stratified pipe flow.It can be seen from the wax gelation mechanism that an increase in water cut can help to reduce the wall/oil-deposit interface shear stress,thereby leading to an increase in the degree of gelation as well as the deposit rate.Furthermore,a local deposit analysis in the circumferential direction was conducted,for water cut 75%and total flow rate 5 m3/h,which provided insights to understand that the thickness on pipe wall was roughly uniformly distributed locates near the top of the pipe and the nearer the position gets close to two points,where the oil-water interface contacts the inner wall,the deposition thickness quickly dropped to 0.It was attributed to the fact that a roughly uniformly thickness far away from the oil-water interface contact the inner wall resulted in the slowly changes temperature along the circumferential pipe wall wetted by oil.

Stability of Stratified Gas-Liquid Flow in Horizontal and Near Horizontal Pipes

A viscous Kelvin-Helmholtz criterion of the interfacial wave instability is proposed in this paper based on the linear stability analysis of a transient one-dimensional two-fluid model. In thismodel, the pressure is evaluated using the local momentum balance rather than the hydrostatic approximation. The criterion predicts well the stability limit of stratified flow in horizontal and nearly horizontal pipes. The experimental and theoretical investigation on the effect of pipe inclination on the interfacial instability are carded out. It is found that the critical liquid height at the onset of interfacial wave instability is insensitive to the pipe inclination. However, the pipe inclination significantly affects critical superficial liquid velocity and wave velocity especially lor low gas velocities.

A NONHYDROSTATIC NUMERICAL MODEL FOR DENSITY STRATIFIED FLOW AND ITS APPLICATIONS

A modular numerical model was developed for simulating density-stratified flow in domains with irregular bottom topography. The model was designed for examining interactions between stratified flow and topography, e.g,, tidally driven flow over two-dimensional sills or internal solitary waves propagating over a shoaling bed. The model was based on the non-hydrostatic vorticity-stream function equations for a continuously stratified fluid in a rotating frame. A self-adaptive grid was adopted in the vertical coordinate, the Alternative Direction Implicit （ADI） scheme was used for the time marching equations while the Poisson equation for stream-function was solved based on the Successive Over Relaxation （SOR） iteration with the Chebyshev acceleration. The numerical techniques were described and three applications of the model were presented.

Transport of Yellow Sand in Stratified Flow over an Isolated Mountain Ridge

The transport of ye been investigated numerica Ilow sand over mountain regions in the presence of internal gravity waves has y. The motion of yellow sand particles has been simulated in a Lagrangian frame of reference by solving the time-dependent Reynolds averaged Navier-Stokes equations. An implicit time integration in a fitted body grid arrangement was used to simulate the stratified flow over an isolated ideally bell-shaped mountain. The transport and deposition of particles of various sizes, and of the altitudes where particles were released have been analyzed. Particular attention was given to transport patterns of different sized particles in various atmospheric conditions. The results show that the particle size and the release altitude are both important factors in determining the trajectories of the particles. Small particles tend to be transported a long distance over the mountains, whereas heavier particles settle down around the release source. Due to the existence of an internal gravity wave, the particle release altitude affects the trajectory of the particles. The analysis and results provide a very useful tool for the study of atmospheric flow and transport of pollutants over real topographies.

Computational Analysis of the Oscillatory Mixed Convection Flow along a Horizontal Circular Cylinder in Thermally Stratified Medium

The present work emphasizes the significance of oscillatory mixed convection stratified fluid and heat transfer characteristics at different stations of non-conducting horizontally circular cylinder in the presence of thermally stratified medium.To remove the difficulties in illustrating the coupled PDE’s,the finite-difference scheme with efficient primitive-variable formulation is proposed to transform dimensionless equations.The numerical simulations of coupled non-dimensional equations are computed in terms velocity of fluid,temperature and magnetic field which are computed to examine the fluctuating components of skin friction,heat transfer and current density for various emerging parameters.The governing parameters namely,thermally stratification parameter𝑆𝑆𝑡𝑡,mixed-convection parameter𝜆𝜆,Prandtl number Pr,magnetic force parameter𝜉𝜉and magnetic-Prandtl number𝛾𝛾are displayed graphically at selected values for velocity and heat transfer mechanism.It is computed that heat transfer attains maximum amplitude and good variations in the presence of thermally stratified parameter at each position𝛼𝛼=𝜋𝜋6⁄,𝛼𝛼=𝜋𝜋3⁄and𝛼𝛼=𝜋𝜋around the surface of non-conducting horizontally cylinder.The velocity of fluid attains certain height at station𝛼𝛼=𝜋𝜋6⁄for higher value of stratification parameter.It is also found that the temperature gradient decreases with stratification parameter𝑆𝑆𝑡𝑡,but it increases after a certain distance𝑌𝑌from the cylinder.The novelty of the current work is that due to non-conducting phenomena the magnetic effects are strongly observed far from the surface but exact at the surface are zero for each position.

Partial phase flow rate measurements for stratified oil-water flow in horizontal wells

To accurately measure and evaluate the oil-water production profile of horizontal wells, a dynamic measurement experiment of oil-water two-phase flow in horizontal wells and numerical simulation were combined to establish a method for measuring the partial phase flow rate of oil-water two-phase stratified flow in horizontal wells. An experimental work was performed in horizontal oil-water two-phase flow simulation well using combination production logging tool including mini-capacitance sensor and mini-spinner. The combination tool provides a recording of holdup and velocity profiles at five different heights of the borehole cross-section. The effect of total flow rate and water-cut on the response of spinner and capacitive sensor at five measured positions were investigated. The capacitance water holdup interpolation imaging algorithm was used to determine the local fluid property and oil-water interface height, and the measured local fluid speed was combined with the numerical simulation result to establish an optimal calculation model for obtaining the partial phase flow rate of the oil-water two-phase stratified flow in the horizontal well. The calculated flow rates of five measured points are basically consistent with the experimental data, the total flow rate and water holdup from calculation are in agreement with the set values in the experiment too, suggesting that the method has high accuracy.

Numerical Simulation on Stratified Flow over an Isolated Mountain Ridge

The characteristics of stratified flow over an isolated mountain ridge have been investigated numerically. The two-dimensional model equations, based on the time-dependent Reynolds averaged Navier- Stokes equations, are solved numerically using an implicit time integration in a fitted body grid arrangement to simulate stratified flow over an isolated ideally bell-shaped mountain. The simulation results are in good agreement with the existing corresponding analytical and approximate solutions. It is shown that for atmospheric conditions where non-hydrostatic effects become dominant, the model is able to reproduce typical flow features. The dispersion characteristics of gaseous pollutants in the stratified flow have also been studied. The dispersion patterns for two typical atmospheric conditions are compared. The results show that the presence of a gravity wave causes vertical stratification of the pollutant concentration and affects the diffusive characteristics of the pollutants.

STABILITY OF DENSITY STRATIFIED FLOW IN THE BOUNDARY LAYER

The stability of the laminar flat plate boundary layer is investigated numerically by solving the linear Orr-Sommerfeld equations for the disturbulence amplitude function. These equations include the terms of viscosity, density stratification, and diffusion. Neutral stability curve and the critical Re numbers are computed for various Richardson （Ri） numbers and Schmidt （Sc） numbers. The results show that the larger the Ri, the larger the critical Re for Sc 〈 10. The flow is stable for Ri 〈 0, when Sc is very small or the mass diffusion coefficient is very large. But for Ri 〉 0, the effects of diffusion are reversed for Sc 〈 10. For Sc 〉 10, the critical Re rapidly decreases to zero as the Sc increases for a given Ri number. The critical Re rapidly decreases as the Ri increases.

Numerical simulation of stratified turbulent two-phase flow in aquatic environment

The two fluid model of stratified turbulent two phase flow in aquatic environment is developed in this paper. The motion of each phase is described by a unified multi fluid model in an Eulerian coordinate system. The laws of turbulent transportation for each phase, and the restriction of each other between the two phases are completely simulated. The complex two phase turbulence with strong buoyancy effects is selected to examine numerically. The extensive experimental data obtained in stratified flow are used here. Comparison of the results of numerical simulation with the experimental data is conducted. It has shown that the results of numerical simulation are satisfactory.

THE SOLITARY WAVES IN STRATIFIED SHEAR FLOW

In this paper,the basic equation of internal long waves in stratified shear flow is derived un- der Boussinesq assumption,the first order approximation solution is given for solitary waves with the effects of slowly varying topograph at the sea bottom,weak stratification and basic shear flow.

Equivalent and Nonequivalent Barotropic Modes for Rotating Stratified Flows

All the possible equivalent barotropic (EB) laminar solutions are firstly explored,and all the possible non-EB elliptic circulations and hyperbolic laminar modes of rotating stratified fluids are discovered in this paper.The EB circulations (including the vortex streets and hurricane like vortices) possess rich structures,because either the arbitrary solutions of arbitrary nonlinear Poisson equations can be used or an arbitrary two-dimensional stream function is revealed which may be broadly applied in atmospheric and oceanic dynamics,plasma physics,astrophysics and so on.The discovery of the non-EB modes disproves a known conjecture.

New turbulence modeling for air/water stratified flow

The prediction of interfacial turbulence characteristics is one of the still challenging of two-phase stratified flow.The evaluation of some important parameters such as interfacial heat transfer coefficient based on turbulence kinetic energy and turbulence dissipation rate in some models,intensifies the importance of turbulence flow correct simulation.High gradient of velocity and turbulence kinetic energy at the interface of two-phase stratified flow leads to a major overestimation or underestimation of flow characteristics without any special treatment.Consideration of a source function of turbulence eddy frequency at the interface is one of the common solution employed in past researches.Although this solution remedies some shortcomings of traditional methods in smooth stratified flow,its application in wavy stratified flow needs the other modifications.The examination of turbulence characteristics near the free surface reveals that,in addition to turbulence eddy frequency,the other source function of turbulence kinetic energy should be considered near the free interface.So,a new source function of turbulence kinetic energy is proposed at the interface based on flow condition.This new method has been employed for Fabre et al.(1987)experiment designed for air/water stratified flow.The results of simulation have a good agreement with experimental data and turbulence characteristic can be captured near the free surface.

Numerical Simulation of Unidirectional Stratified Flow by Moving Particle Semi Implicit Method

Numerical simulation of stratified flow of two fluids between two infinite parallel plates using the Moving Particle Semi-implicit(MPS)method is presented.The developing process from entrance to fully development flow is captured.In the simulation,the computational domain is represented by various types of particles.Governing equations are described based on particles and their interactions.Grids are not necessary in any calculation steps of the simulation.The particle number density is implicitly required to be constant to satisfy incompressibility.The weight function is used to describe the interaction between different particles.The particle is considered to constitute the free interface if the particle number density is below a set point.Results for various combinations of density,viscosity,mass flow rates,and distance between the two parallel plates are presented.The proposed procedure is validated using the derived exact solution and the earlier numerical results from the Level-Set method.Furthermore,the evolution of the interface in the developing region is captured and compares well with the derived exact solutions in the developed region.

Prediction of pressure gradient and hold-up in horizontal liquid-liquid pipe flow

This paper aims to propose correlations to predict pressure gradient,friction factor and fluid phase hold-up in liquid-liquid horizontal pipe flow.To develop the correlations,experiments are conducted using high viscous oils(202 and 630 mPa⋅s)in a steel pipe of length 11.25 m and length-to-diameter ratio of 708.In addition,the experimental data from the literature comprising wide range of flow and fluid properties is analyzed.For the analysis,the liquid-liquid pipe flow data is categorized into two as:stratified and dispersed.The existing friction factor correlations are modified to incorporate the effects of viscosity of the oil phase,interfacial curvature(contact/wetting angle-in lieu of material of the pipe)and fluid phase fraction.In the two-fluid model of stratified flow,the wall stress and interfacial stress correlations are substituted with superficial velocities of fluids and superficial Reynolds numbers of fluid phases replacing fluid phase velocities and fluid Reynolds numbers.Similarly,for dispersed flow,an effective Reynolds number is described as the sum of superficial Reynolds number of oil and water phases.Substituting the generally employed mean or mixture Reynolds number with the effective Reynolds number into the existing single-phase turbulent flow friction factor correlation,an effective friction factor for oil-water flow is proposed.Employing the proposed correlations,the pressure gradient across the oil-water flow and hold-up volume fraction are predicted with significant reduction in error compared with that of conventionally employed correlations.The average error and standard deviation values of−7.06%,20.72%and 0.31%,18.79%are found for stratified flow and dispersed flow respectively.