TY - THES

T1 - Alternative Artificial Lift Systems with Special Focus on Hydraulic Pumps

AU - Oberbichler, Sophie Marie

N1 - embargoed until null

PY - 2012

Y1 - 2012

N2 - Within the large variety of different artificial lift systems applying Pascal’s Principle i.a. hydraulic drives for sucker rod pumps, which are basically not a new invention in the oil-producing industry can be found. For decades the application of these systems has not been interesting because OPEX where significantly higher than the one of mechanical drives. The first part of this thesis deals with three new developed hydraulic sucker rod drives which imply recent developments, as computer control and real-time monitoring, and the possibility to increase upstroke velocity and therefore to increase the number of strokes per minute as well as new possibilities increase energy efficiency of the system (esp. potential energy storages during the downstroke) increase the economic performance of these systems significantly. While artificial lifting of oil has been done quite early in the history of oil production the de-liquification of gas wells to overcome liquid loading is not so common in the industry. But in order to increase ultimate recovery several new artificial lift systems, especially designed for lifting just small amounts of fluids and decrease CAPEX as well as maintenance necessity and OPEX, have been developed. The second part of this thesis compares two recently developed de-liquification systems in terms of CAPEX, OPEX, maintenance intervals, and application depth etc. in order to find economical solutions for the liquid-loading problem in gas wells. In the third part of this thesis one existing oil well completion (conventional Pump Jack) is compared to a hydraulic drive if it would be installed at the same well under technical and economical aspects. The same is done with an existing gas well that is actually de-watered by a PC-Pump, which is compared to one of the hydraulic deliquification systems.

AB - Within the large variety of different artificial lift systems applying Pascal’s Principle i.a. hydraulic drives for sucker rod pumps, which are basically not a new invention in the oil-producing industry can be found. For decades the application of these systems has not been interesting because OPEX where significantly higher than the one of mechanical drives. The first part of this thesis deals with three new developed hydraulic sucker rod drives which imply recent developments, as computer control and real-time monitoring, and the possibility to increase upstroke velocity and therefore to increase the number of strokes per minute as well as new possibilities increase energy efficiency of the system (esp. potential energy storages during the downstroke) increase the economic performance of these systems significantly. While artificial lifting of oil has been done quite early in the history of oil production the de-liquification of gas wells to overcome liquid loading is not so common in the industry. But in order to increase ultimate recovery several new artificial lift systems, especially designed for lifting just small amounts of fluids and decrease CAPEX as well as maintenance necessity and OPEX, have been developed. The second part of this thesis compares two recently developed de-liquification systems in terms of CAPEX, OPEX, maintenance intervals, and application depth etc. in order to find economical solutions for the liquid-loading problem in gas wells. In the third part of this thesis one existing oil well completion (conventional Pump Jack) is compared to a hydraulic drive if it would be installed at the same well under technical and economical aspects. The same is done with an existing gas well that is actually de-watered by a PC-Pump, which is compared to one of the hydraulic deliquification systems.

KW - Alternative Fördersysteme

KW - hydraulischer Tiefpumpenantrieb

KW - Gassonden-Entwässerung

KW - hydraulische Fördermethoden

KW - artificial lift systems

KW - hydraulic sucker rod pump drives

KW - de-liquification systems

M3 - Master's Thesis

ER -