New Design and Optimization of a Jet Pump to Boost Heavy Oil Production
In the Oil and Gas industry, installing pipe loops is a well-known hydraulic practice to increase oil pipeline capacities. Nevertheless, pipe loops could promote an unfavorable phenomenon known as fouling. That means that in a heavy oil-water mixture gathering system with low flow velocities, an oil...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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MDPI AG
2022-01-01
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| Series: | Computation |
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| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2079-3197/10/1/11 |
| _version_ | 1797494949051105280 |
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| author | Jens Toteff Miguel Asuaje Ricardo Noguera |
| author_facet | Jens Toteff Miguel Asuaje Ricardo Noguera |
| author_sort | Jens Toteff |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | In the Oil and Gas industry, installing pipe loops is a well-known hydraulic practice to increase oil pipeline capacities. Nevertheless, pipe loops could promote an unfavorable phenomenon known as fouling. That means that in a heavy oil-water mixture gathering system with low flow velocities, an oil-water stratified flow pattern will appear. In consequence, due to high viscosity, the oil stick on the pipe, causing a reduction of the effective diameter, reducing handled fluids production, and increasing energy consumption. As jet pumps increase total handled flow, increase the fluid velocities, and promote the homogenous mixture of oil and water, this type of pump could result attractive compared to other multiphase pump systems in reactivating heavy crude oil transport lines. Jet pumps are highly reliable, robust equipment with modest maintenance, ideal for many applications, mainly in the oil and gas industry. Nevertheless, their design method and performance analysis are rarely known in the literature and keep a high experimental component similar to most pumping equipment. This paper proposes a numerical study and the optimization of a booster multiphase jet pump system installed in a heavy oil conventional loop of a gathering system. First, the optimization of a traditionally designed jet pump, combining CFD simulation and optimization algorithms using commercials software (ANSYS CFX<sup>®</sup> and PIPEIT<sup>®</sup> tool), has been carried out. This method allowed evaluating the effect of multiple geometrical and operational variables that influence the global performance of the pump to run more than 400 geometries automatically in a reduced time frame. The optimized pump offers a substantial improvement over the original concerning total flow capacity (+17%), energy, and flow distribution. Then, the effect of the three jet pump plugin configurations in a heavy oil conventional trunkline loop was analyzed. Simulations were carried out for different driving fluid pressures and compared against a traditional pipeline loop’s performance. Optimum plugin connection increases fluid production by 30%. Finally, a new eccentric jet pump geometry has been proposed to improve exit velocities and pressure fields. This eccentric jet pump with the best connection was analyzed over the same conditions as the concentric optimized one. An improvement of 2% on handled fluid was achieved consistently with the observed uniform velocity field at the exit of the pump. A better total fluid distribution between the main and the loop line is obtained, handling around half of the complete fluid each. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-10T01:41:35Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-a15ee96e9bc94176ac659751d9c01d99 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2079-3197 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-10T01:41:35Z |
| publishDate | 2022-01-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Computation |
| spelling | doaj.art-a15ee96e9bc94176ac659751d9c01d992023-11-23T13:23:21ZengMDPI AGComputation2079-31972022-01-011011110.3390/computation10010011New Design and Optimization of a Jet Pump to Boost Heavy Oil ProductionJens Toteff0Miguel Asuaje1Ricardo Noguera2Energy Conversion Deparment, Simón Bolívar University, Caracas 89000, VenezuelaEnergy Conversion Deparment, Simón Bolívar University, Caracas 89000, VenezuelaÉcole Nationale Supérieure d’Arts et Métiers, LIFSE—Arts et Métiers, 75103 Paris, FranceIn the Oil and Gas industry, installing pipe loops is a well-known hydraulic practice to increase oil pipeline capacities. Nevertheless, pipe loops could promote an unfavorable phenomenon known as fouling. That means that in a heavy oil-water mixture gathering system with low flow velocities, an oil-water stratified flow pattern will appear. In consequence, due to high viscosity, the oil stick on the pipe, causing a reduction of the effective diameter, reducing handled fluids production, and increasing energy consumption. As jet pumps increase total handled flow, increase the fluid velocities, and promote the homogenous mixture of oil and water, this type of pump could result attractive compared to other multiphase pump systems in reactivating heavy crude oil transport lines. Jet pumps are highly reliable, robust equipment with modest maintenance, ideal for many applications, mainly in the oil and gas industry. Nevertheless, their design method and performance analysis are rarely known in the literature and keep a high experimental component similar to most pumping equipment. This paper proposes a numerical study and the optimization of a booster multiphase jet pump system installed in a heavy oil conventional loop of a gathering system. First, the optimization of a traditionally designed jet pump, combining CFD simulation and optimization algorithms using commercials software (ANSYS CFX<sup>®</sup> and PIPEIT<sup>®</sup> tool), has been carried out. This method allowed evaluating the effect of multiple geometrical and operational variables that influence the global performance of the pump to run more than 400 geometries automatically in a reduced time frame. The optimized pump offers a substantial improvement over the original concerning total flow capacity (+17%), energy, and flow distribution. Then, the effect of the three jet pump plugin configurations in a heavy oil conventional trunkline loop was analyzed. Simulations were carried out for different driving fluid pressures and compared against a traditional pipeline loop’s performance. Optimum plugin connection increases fluid production by 30%. Finally, a new eccentric jet pump geometry has been proposed to improve exit velocities and pressure fields. This eccentric jet pump with the best connection was analyzed over the same conditions as the concentric optimized one. An improvement of 2% on handled fluid was achieved consistently with the observed uniform velocity field at the exit of the pump. A better total fluid distribution between the main and the loop line is obtained, handling around half of the complete fluid each.https://www.mdpi.com/2079-3197/10/1/11CFDjet pumpheavy oil fieldoil production |
| spellingShingle | Jens Toteff Miguel Asuaje Ricardo Noguera New Design and Optimization of a Jet Pump to Boost Heavy Oil Production Computation CFD jet pump heavy oil field oil production |
| title | New Design and Optimization of a Jet Pump to Boost Heavy Oil Production |
| title_full | New Design and Optimization of a Jet Pump to Boost Heavy Oil Production |
| title_fullStr | New Design and Optimization of a Jet Pump to Boost Heavy Oil Production |
| title_full_unstemmed | New Design and Optimization of a Jet Pump to Boost Heavy Oil Production |
| title_short | New Design and Optimization of a Jet Pump to Boost Heavy Oil Production |
| title_sort | new design and optimization of a jet pump to boost heavy oil production |
| topic | CFD jet pump heavy oil field oil production |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2079-3197/10/1/11 |
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