Tilted Vessel Desander for High-Pressure Multiphase Flow
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Current desanding devices for oil and gas wells face challenges such as equipment abrasion, high maintenance costs, and inefficiencies in removing particulates from multiphase fluid streams, particularly due to limitations in pressure handling, filter bag failures, and difficulties in separating particulates from effluents with multiple phases.
Innovation Solution
A desanding device with a tilted vessel and a recovery chamber system that separates particulates from gas and liquid through a fluid inlet, allowing particulates to settle and be removed while maintaining the vessel pressurized, and includes a particulate drain for easy accumulation and removal, enhancing separation efficiency and storage capacity.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If a P-Tank is used for desanding, then sand production can be temporarily controlled, but the large size of the tank restricts maximum operating pressure to 1,000-2,100 kPa and requires pressure control equipment that is at risk of failure due to increased gas velocity
Solution Approach 1:
The patent changes the operating pressure parameter by using a smaller, stronger vessel designed to withstand higher pressures (up to 7,000 kPa or more). This is achieved by modifying the vessel size and strength parameters, allowing operation at pressures significantly higher than conventional P-Tanks while maintaining desanding effectiveness through the high-velocity fluid stream that prevents sand accumulation.
2Strength
If pressure is reduced to protect the P-Tank, then the tank is protected from overpressure, but gas velocity increases making the effluent more abrasive and placing the pressure controlling choke at risk of failure
Solution Approach 1:
The patent changes the pressure parameter by designing a vessel with higher pressure tolerance, which paradoxically allows operation at higher pressures rather than lower. This increases gas velocity and maintains high-velocity flow through the desander, which actually reduces sand accumulation and minimizes abrasion to downstream equipment by preventing sand from reaching those components.
3Reliability
If filter bags are used to remove particulates, then sand removal can be achieved, but the bags become a cause of pressure drop and often fail due to liquid flow, requiring costly disposal
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts and removes the filter bag component entirely from the system. Instead of using filter bags that cause pressure drop and require disposal, the invention uses a direct gravity-based separation approach where sand settles in the bottom of the vessel and is periodically discharged through a drain at the lowest point, eliminating the intermediary filtering component that caused the problems.
4Productivity
If high fluid stream velocities are used to elutriate particles up the well and to the surface, then sand can be transported, but severe erosion of production equipment occurs causing catastrophic failure
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts sand from the fluid stream before it reaches downstream equipment by using gravity separation in the desander vessel. Sand settles in the bottom and is discharged through a dedicated drain, preventing it from continuing downstream where it would cause erosion. This allows high-velocity flow to be maintained in the production line while sand is removed at the source.
Solution Approach 2:
The desander vessel acts as an intermediary device between the wellhead and downstream equipment. It provides a controlled environment where sand is separated from the fluid stream through gravity settling, and the cleaned fluid then proceeds to downstream equipment at reduced velocity, while sand is discharged separately through the drain system.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The solution effectively reduces equipment wear, lowers maintenance costs, and improves the efficiency of particulate removal from multiphase streams by allowing continuous operation and easy particulate collection, even during high sand production periods, thus preventing downstream equipment damage.
Implementation Method 1
a treatment chamber receiving a multiple-phase fluid stream thereinto, and a recovery chamber receiving treated fluid from the treatment chamber
Implementation Method 2
Hydrocylone or cyclone devices are also known for separating particles from liquid mixture by exploiting the centripetal force
Data Source
Figure 1
Figure 2
Figure 3
AI summary
An apparatus and method for removing particulates from a multiple- phase fluid stream is disclosed. The apparatus comprises a treatment chamber having a fluid inlet for receiving the multiple-phase fluid stream. The apparatus also comprises a recovery chamber having a gas channel and a liquid channel in fluid communication with the treatment chamber at a gas and a liquid port, respectively. The gas and liquid channels converge at an intake port of a fluid outlet for discharging particulate-removed gas and liquid.