Offshore production fluids from the reservoir are often transported in pipelines from the wellheads to the platform and from the platform to process facilities. At low flow velocity water, sand or liquids like condensate could settle at the bottom of pipelines that may lead to grave implications for flow assurance. During shutdown the settled heavy liquid (e.g. water), could result in corrosion in pipelines, while following restart stages the settled water could form water plugs that could damage equipment, while settled sand could also form a blockage that needs to be purged. Furthermore, there is a requirement to know the quantity of water and base sediment for fiscal metering and custody transfer purposes. A series of experiments were carried out to observe low water cut in oil and water flows in four inch diameter pipeline. Similarly low sand concentrations in water and sand, water, air and sand flows were observed in two inch diameter pipelines. Conductive film thickness sensors were used to ascertain structural velocities, height and dense phase fractions. Comparisons are made between two cases in order to gain better understanding of the behaviours and dispersal process of low loading denser phase in multiphase flows. The arrangement enabled production of flow regime maps for low water cut oil and water flow, as well as water sand and water, air and sand flows, structural velocities and denser phase removal velocities were also ascertained. Actual in-situ liquid velocities were obtained experimentally. A novel detection of sand in water and water and sand flows was produced. The experimentally obtained film thickness was in agreement with two fluid model predictions. Thus, confirming use of conductive sensors for dense phase classification, film thickness, velocity and holdup measurements in pipelines.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:738622 |
| Date | January 2016 |
| Creators | Koguna, Aminu Ja'Afar Abubakar |
| Contributors | Yeung, Hoi |
| Publisher | Cranfield University |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Source | http://dspace.lib.cranfield.ac.uk/handle/1826/13094 |
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