This work aimed at investigating the crucial factor in building and maintaining the combustion front during in-situ combustion(ISC),oxidized coke and pyrolyzed coke.The surface morphologies,elemental contents,and non-...This work aimed at investigating the crucial factor in building and maintaining the combustion front during in-situ combustion(ISC),oxidized coke and pyrolyzed coke.The surface morphologies,elemental contents,and non-isothermal mass losses of the oxidized and pyrolyzed cokes were thoroughly examined.The results indicated that the oxidized coke could be combusted at a lower temperature compared to the pyrolyzed coke due primarily to their differences in the molecular polarity and microstructure.Kinetic triplets of coke combustion were determined using iso-conversional models and one advanced integral master plots method.The activation energy values of the oxidized and pyrolyzed cokes varied in the range of 130-153 k J/mol and 95-120 kJ/mol,respectively.The most appropriate reaction model of combustion of the oxidized and pyrolyzed cokes followed three-dimensional diffusion model(D_(3)) and random nucleation and subsequent growth model(F_(1)),respectively.These observations assisted in building the numerical model of these two types of cokes to simulate the ISC process.展开更多
Low-temperature oxidation(LTO)is the main reaction that affects fuel formation in the in-situ combustion process,which has important significance for the subsequent combustion propulsion and the successful extraction ...Low-temperature oxidation(LTO)is the main reaction that affects fuel formation in the in-situ combustion process,which has important significance for the subsequent combustion propulsion and the successful extraction of crude oil.In this study,heavy oil was subjected to LTO reactions at different temperatures.Three types of reaction products with varying oxidation depths were characterized in terms of the number of oxygen atoms and the polarity of the molecule to reveal the low-temperature oxidation process of the heavy oil.Ketone compounds and acid polyoxides in the oil phase and deep oxidation products with a higher number of oxygen atoms in the coke were identified with increasing oxidation depth.The experimental results showed that the oxidation reaction of the heavy oil changed from kinetic-controlled to diffusion-controlled in the open oxidation system of the heavy oil as the oxidation depth increased.The oxidation reaction of the oil phase reached a maximum and stable value in oxygen content.The molecular compositions of the ketone compound and acid polyoxide did not change significantly with further increase in reaction temperature.The molecular compositions of the deep oxidation products with a higher number of oxygen atoms in the coke phase changed significantly.The coke precursor molecules with a lower oxygen content and condensation degree participated in the coke formation,and the oxidation reaction pathway and the complexity of the oxidation product component also increased.展开更多
From a time value of revenue point of view,it is preferred that the time between reservoir stimulation and oil production response is small.Heavy oil combustion processes have a lag time between air injection and liqu...From a time value of revenue point of view,it is preferred that the time between reservoir stimulation and oil production response is small.Heavy oil combustion processes have a lag time between air injection and liquid production,but the common practice in production data analysis uses simultaneous injection and production data when seeking a relationship between them.In this research,the time scales of production for the Kerrobert toe-to-heel air injection(THAI)heavy oil project in Saskatchewan,Canada,is analyzed by using cross correlation analysis,i.e.time delay analysis between air injection and oil production.The results reveal two time scales with respect to production response with two distinctive recovery mechanisms:(1)a short time scale response(nearly instantaneous)where oil production peaks right after air injection(directly after opening production well)reflecting cold heavy oil production mechanisms,and(2)a longer time scale(of order of 100-300 days)response where peak production occurs associated with the collective phenomena of air injection,heat generating reactions,heat transfer,and finally,heated mobilized heavy oil drainage to the production well.This understanding of the two time scales and associated production mechanisms provides a basis for improving the performance of THAI.展开更多
为了认识稠油开发过程中低温氧化与高温氧化阶段原油变化规律,利用静态氧化釜开展稠油的高低温氧化实验,借助傅里叶变换离子回旋共振质谱分析技术对高低温氧化前后的原油分子量及O、N、S杂原子化合物特征开展研究,结果表明:原油低温氧...为了认识稠油开发过程中低温氧化与高温氧化阶段原油变化规律,利用静态氧化釜开展稠油的高低温氧化实验,借助傅里叶变换离子回旋共振质谱分析技术对高低温氧化前后的原油分子量及O、N、S杂原子化合物特征开展研究,结果表明:原油低温氧化阶段分子量分布特征与原样相似,相对分子量分布范围在200~750,整体呈平缓状单峰型分布,高温氧化阶段分子量分布范围前移,呈明显的前峰单峰型分布;杂原子化合物中的O元素在低温氧化阶段主要以无环的饱和二元酸形式存在,在高温氧化阶段受环化、芳构化及脱甲基作用的影响,伴随着侧链烷基及杂原子基团的断裂和芳构化过程,造成原油中杂原子化合物向着碳数更小、双键当量(double bond equivalents,DBE)值更低的方向演化。该研究探索了温度与原油结构及化学组成之间的关系,对于指导稠油开发现场具有重要意义。展开更多
The presence of a bottom water(BW)layer in heavy oil reservoirs can present substantial problems for efficient oil recovery for all recovery techniques.Hence,it is necessary to know how particular production processes...The presence of a bottom water(BW)layer in heavy oil reservoirs can present substantial problems for efficient oil recovery for all recovery techniques.Hence,it is necessary to know how particular production processes are affected by different BW layer thicknesses,and how standard production procedures can be adapted to handle such reservoirs.Toe-to-heel air injection(THAI)is a thermally efficient process,generating in situ energy in the reservoir by burning a fraction of the oil-in-place as coke and has the potential to economically and environmentally friendly work in reservoirs with BW layer.However,to ascertain that,studies are needed first.These are conducted via numerical simulations using commercial reservoir thermal simulator,CMG STARS.This work has shown that the shape of the combustion zone in THAI remains forward-leaning even in the presence of a BW layer,indicating that the process is stable,and that there is no oxygen bypassing of the combustion front.However,the oil recovery rate is highly negatively affected by how large the thickness of the BWzone is,and the severity of such effect is determined to be proportional to the thickness of the BW layer.This study also shows that there is a period of low oil production rate which corresponds to mobilised oil displacement into the BW zone which in turn causes a surge in water production rate.The practical implication of this is that prolonged period of low oil production rates will expose companies and/or investors to higher risk due to the oil market volatility.In this study,it is also revealed that the height of the mobilised oil that is displaced into the BW zone equates to that of the displaced and replaced water thereby implying that when the BW layer thickness is 50%that of the oil layer(OL),less than 50%of the mobilised oil will be recovered when the entire reservoir is swept by the combustion front.Therefore,conclusively,applying the THAI process in its conventional form in reservoirs containing bottom water is not recommended,and as a result,a new strategy is needed to enhance process economics by improving the oil production and hence recovery rates.展开更多
According to the analysis of the 2020 estimates of the International Energy Agency(2020),the world will require up to 770 billion barrels of oil from now to 2040.However,based on the British Petroleum(BP)statistical r...According to the analysis of the 2020 estimates of the International Energy Agency(2020),the world will require up to 770 billion barrels of oil from now to 2040.However,based on the British Petroleum(BP)statistical review of world energy 2020,the world-wide total reserve of the conventional light oil is only 520.2 billion barrels as at the end of 2019.That implies that the remaining 249.8 billion barrels of oil urgently needed to ensure a smooth transition to a decarbonised global energy and economic systems is provided must come from unconventional oils(i.e.heavy oils and bitumen)reserves.But heavy oils and bitumen are very difficult to produce and the current commercial production technologies have poor efficiency and release large quantities of greenhouse gases.Therefore,these resources should ideally be upgraded and produced using technologies that have greener credentials.This is where the energy-efficient,environmentally friendly,and self-sustaining THAI-CAPRI coupled in situ combustion and in situ catalytic upgrading process comes in.However,the novel THAI-CAPRI process is trialled only once at field and it has not gained wide recognition due to poor understanding of the optimal design parameters and procedures.Hence,this work reports the first ever results of investigations of the effect of operating pressure on the performance of the THAI-CAPRI process.Two experimental scale numerical models of the process based on Athabasca tar sand properties were run at pressures of 8000 kPa and 500 kPa respectively using CMG STARS.This study has shown that the higher the operating pressure,the larger the API gravity and the higher the cumulative volume of high-quality oil is produced(i.e.a 2300 cm3 of z24 oAPI oil produced at 8000 kPa versus the 2050 cm3 of z17.5 oAPI oil produced at 500 kPa).The study has further shown that despite presence of annular catalyst layer,the THAI-CAPRI process operates stably.However,it is found that a more stable and safer operation of the process can only be achieved at optimal pressure that should lie between 500 kPa and 8000 kPa,especially since at the lower pressure,should the process time be extended,it will not take long before oxygen breakthrough takes place.The simulations have shown in details that at higher pressures,the catalyst bed is easily and rapidly coked and thus the catalyst life will be very short especially during actual field reservoir operations.Since the oil drainage flux into the HP well at field-scale is different from that at laboratory-scale,and at field-scale,the combustion front does not propagate inside the HP well,it will be practically very challenging to regenerate or replace the coke-deactivated annular catalyst layer in actual reservoir operations.There-fore,it is concluded that during field operation designs,an optimum pressure must be selected such that a balance is obtained between the combustion front stability and the degree of catalytic upgrading,and between the catalyst life and its effectiveness.展开更多
基金supported by Chinese Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2021M692696)the National Science and Technology Project (2016ZX05058-003-017)Sichuan Science and Technology Program (2021YFH0081)。
文摘This work aimed at investigating the crucial factor in building and maintaining the combustion front during in-situ combustion(ISC),oxidized coke and pyrolyzed coke.The surface morphologies,elemental contents,and non-isothermal mass losses of the oxidized and pyrolyzed cokes were thoroughly examined.The results indicated that the oxidized coke could be combusted at a lower temperature compared to the pyrolyzed coke due primarily to their differences in the molecular polarity and microstructure.Kinetic triplets of coke combustion were determined using iso-conversional models and one advanced integral master plots method.The activation energy values of the oxidized and pyrolyzed cokes varied in the range of 130-153 k J/mol and 95-120 kJ/mol,respectively.The most appropriate reaction model of combustion of the oxidized and pyrolyzed cokes followed three-dimensional diffusion model(D_(3)) and random nucleation and subsequent growth model(F_(1)),respectively.These observations assisted in building the numerical model of these two types of cokes to simulate the ISC process.
基金supported by the National Key R&D Program of China(2018YFA0702400)the PetroChina Exploration&Production Company(KS2020-01-05).
文摘Low-temperature oxidation(LTO)is the main reaction that affects fuel formation in the in-situ combustion process,which has important significance for the subsequent combustion propulsion and the successful extraction of crude oil.In this study,heavy oil was subjected to LTO reactions at different temperatures.Three types of reaction products with varying oxidation depths were characterized in terms of the number of oxygen atoms and the polarity of the molecule to reveal the low-temperature oxidation process of the heavy oil.Ketone compounds and acid polyoxides in the oil phase and deep oxidation products with a higher number of oxygen atoms in the coke were identified with increasing oxidation depth.The experimental results showed that the oxidation reaction of the heavy oil changed from kinetic-controlled to diffusion-controlled in the open oxidation system of the heavy oil as the oxidation depth increased.The oxidation reaction of the oil phase reached a maximum and stable value in oxygen content.The molecular compositions of the ketone compound and acid polyoxide did not change significantly with further increase in reaction temperature.The molecular compositions of the deep oxidation products with a higher number of oxygen atoms in the coke phase changed significantly.The coke precursor molecules with a lower oxygen content and condensation degree participated in the coke formation,and the oxidation reaction pathway and the complexity of the oxidation product component also increased.
基金support from the Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering at the University of Calgary,the University of Calgary’s Canada First Research Excellence Fund program(the Global Research Initiative for Sustainable Low-Carbon Unconventional Resources)
文摘From a time value of revenue point of view,it is preferred that the time between reservoir stimulation and oil production response is small.Heavy oil combustion processes have a lag time between air injection and liquid production,but the common practice in production data analysis uses simultaneous injection and production data when seeking a relationship between them.In this research,the time scales of production for the Kerrobert toe-to-heel air injection(THAI)heavy oil project in Saskatchewan,Canada,is analyzed by using cross correlation analysis,i.e.time delay analysis between air injection and oil production.The results reveal two time scales with respect to production response with two distinctive recovery mechanisms:(1)a short time scale response(nearly instantaneous)where oil production peaks right after air injection(directly after opening production well)reflecting cold heavy oil production mechanisms,and(2)a longer time scale(of order of 100-300 days)response where peak production occurs associated with the collective phenomena of air injection,heat generating reactions,heat transfer,and finally,heated mobilized heavy oil drainage to the production well.This understanding of the two time scales and associated production mechanisms provides a basis for improving the performance of THAI.
文摘为了认识稠油开发过程中低温氧化与高温氧化阶段原油变化规律,利用静态氧化釜开展稠油的高低温氧化实验,借助傅里叶变换离子回旋共振质谱分析技术对高低温氧化前后的原油分子量及O、N、S杂原子化合物特征开展研究,结果表明:原油低温氧化阶段分子量分布特征与原样相似,相对分子量分布范围在200~750,整体呈平缓状单峰型分布,高温氧化阶段分子量分布范围前移,呈明显的前峰单峰型分布;杂原子化合物中的O元素在低温氧化阶段主要以无环的饱和二元酸形式存在,在高温氧化阶段受环化、芳构化及脱甲基作用的影响,伴随着侧链烷基及杂原子基团的断裂和芳构化过程,造成原油中杂原子化合物向着碳数更小、双键当量(double bond equivalents,DBE)值更低的方向演化。该研究探索了温度与原油结构及化学组成之间的关系,对于指导稠油开发现场具有重要意义。
文摘The presence of a bottom water(BW)layer in heavy oil reservoirs can present substantial problems for efficient oil recovery for all recovery techniques.Hence,it is necessary to know how particular production processes are affected by different BW layer thicknesses,and how standard production procedures can be adapted to handle such reservoirs.Toe-to-heel air injection(THAI)is a thermally efficient process,generating in situ energy in the reservoir by burning a fraction of the oil-in-place as coke and has the potential to economically and environmentally friendly work in reservoirs with BW layer.However,to ascertain that,studies are needed first.These are conducted via numerical simulations using commercial reservoir thermal simulator,CMG STARS.This work has shown that the shape of the combustion zone in THAI remains forward-leaning even in the presence of a BW layer,indicating that the process is stable,and that there is no oxygen bypassing of the combustion front.However,the oil recovery rate is highly negatively affected by how large the thickness of the BWzone is,and the severity of such effect is determined to be proportional to the thickness of the BW layer.This study also shows that there is a period of low oil production rate which corresponds to mobilised oil displacement into the BW zone which in turn causes a surge in water production rate.The practical implication of this is that prolonged period of low oil production rates will expose companies and/or investors to higher risk due to the oil market volatility.In this study,it is also revealed that the height of the mobilised oil that is displaced into the BW zone equates to that of the displaced and replaced water thereby implying that when the BW layer thickness is 50%that of the oil layer(OL),less than 50%of the mobilised oil will be recovered when the entire reservoir is swept by the combustion front.Therefore,conclusively,applying the THAI process in its conventional form in reservoirs containing bottom water is not recommended,and as a result,a new strategy is needed to enhance process economics by improving the oil production and hence recovery rates.
文摘According to the analysis of the 2020 estimates of the International Energy Agency(2020),the world will require up to 770 billion barrels of oil from now to 2040.However,based on the British Petroleum(BP)statistical review of world energy 2020,the world-wide total reserve of the conventional light oil is only 520.2 billion barrels as at the end of 2019.That implies that the remaining 249.8 billion barrels of oil urgently needed to ensure a smooth transition to a decarbonised global energy and economic systems is provided must come from unconventional oils(i.e.heavy oils and bitumen)reserves.But heavy oils and bitumen are very difficult to produce and the current commercial production technologies have poor efficiency and release large quantities of greenhouse gases.Therefore,these resources should ideally be upgraded and produced using technologies that have greener credentials.This is where the energy-efficient,environmentally friendly,and self-sustaining THAI-CAPRI coupled in situ combustion and in situ catalytic upgrading process comes in.However,the novel THAI-CAPRI process is trialled only once at field and it has not gained wide recognition due to poor understanding of the optimal design parameters and procedures.Hence,this work reports the first ever results of investigations of the effect of operating pressure on the performance of the THAI-CAPRI process.Two experimental scale numerical models of the process based on Athabasca tar sand properties were run at pressures of 8000 kPa and 500 kPa respectively using CMG STARS.This study has shown that the higher the operating pressure,the larger the API gravity and the higher the cumulative volume of high-quality oil is produced(i.e.a 2300 cm3 of z24 oAPI oil produced at 8000 kPa versus the 2050 cm3 of z17.5 oAPI oil produced at 500 kPa).The study has further shown that despite presence of annular catalyst layer,the THAI-CAPRI process operates stably.However,it is found that a more stable and safer operation of the process can only be achieved at optimal pressure that should lie between 500 kPa and 8000 kPa,especially since at the lower pressure,should the process time be extended,it will not take long before oxygen breakthrough takes place.The simulations have shown in details that at higher pressures,the catalyst bed is easily and rapidly coked and thus the catalyst life will be very short especially during actual field reservoir operations.Since the oil drainage flux into the HP well at field-scale is different from that at laboratory-scale,and at field-scale,the combustion front does not propagate inside the HP well,it will be practically very challenging to regenerate or replace the coke-deactivated annular catalyst layer in actual reservoir operations.There-fore,it is concluded that during field operation designs,an optimum pressure must be selected such that a balance is obtained between the combustion front stability and the degree of catalytic upgrading,and between the catalyst life and its effectiveness.
