Clariant Oil Services Improves Separation Performance in Oman Heavy Oil Facility

Benefits

• 31% Reduction in chemical usage, generating an annual savings of $600,000   
• Improved interface control and reduced BS&W excursions
• 30% Improvement in oil-in-water (OIW)
• Recovery of an additional 27,000 barrels of export oil per year

Background

A major oil and gas operator in Oman was experiencing separation difficulties that resulted in unacceptable produced water quality. The onshore facility produces 157,000 bbls of 21° API crude together with 1,400,000 bbls of water per day, resulting in a water cut of 90%.

Fluids are produced from several gathering centers and combined into six inter-field pipelines before treatment in a central processing facility. The co-mingled fluids are initially processed through free water knock out tanks at ambient temperature. The oil is then heated to 65° C before entering concentric wash tanks and finally routed to crude storage tanks prior to export. The produced water from each tank is further processed in CPI separators and subsequently injected downhole.

The incumbent demulsifier was injected at 7 to 8 ppm into eight locations upstream of the central processing facility. In order to maintain the crude export BS&W below the 0.6% specification, the produced water quality was routinely above the 150 ppm target, as can be seen in Figure 1 herein.

Clariant Oil Services Solutions and Value Delivered

Clariant Oil Services has extensive experience in treating heavy crudes. In conjunction with the operator, fluid separation experts were mobilized to the field to perform bottle tests, which included novel screening for water treatment evaluation. The demulsifier PHASETREAT 6105 was developed specifically for this application, and during the field trial, it was observed to improve interface control, minimize BS&W excursions and reduce the content of oil in the produced water to as low as 80 ppm.

The field trial was performed during pigging operations in winter with ambient temperatures as low as 5° C. The dose rate of PHASETREAT 6105 demulsifier was systematically reduced throughout the trial at all injection locations and finally optimized at 4 ppm, as shown in Figure 2 on page 3.

PHASETREAT 6105 was able to significantly improve the produced water quality to meet the specification of the operator whilst providing annual savings of approximately $600,000 through the reduced dose rate and logistics costs. As a consequence of the OIW improvement, an additional 27,000 barrels of oil per year can be exported.

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