Heavy Oil Operating System

Looking to the oil price plummeting, E&P organizations strongly consider changes to their strategic focus, from volume of production to efficiency of production. We are pleased to mention that our research and development efforts done in the past year are clearly aligned with the new E&P goals: cost reductions while increasing crude production.

We would like to introduce to you our heavy oil operating system – HOOS – a new artificial oil lifting technology designed for high energy efficiency, low workover cost and increased production. The technology replaces the vertical pumping paradigm with vertical transportation. The transport is facilitated by an oil adherent, continuous, extremely durable textile belt, capable of lifting up to 100 bbl of heavy oil per day. The belt is so strong that is able to resist to tensions higher than 35 tonnes. It is also non-abrasive and specially designed to endure corrosive conditions of oil environment up to one year.

HOOS is the artificial oil lifting technology designed to change the paradigm from vertical oil pumping to oil transportation. It was engineered with focus on productivity, cost & energy efficiency, extreme reliability, security and care for the environment.

The technological principle

The underground oil is transported to the surface using a high resistance, oil absorbent belt. The O shape belt goes underground, reaches the downhole unit diving in oil under the static level, absorbs the oil (part of it is absorbed, part it is sticking), then it is transported at the surface where the absorbed and sticking oil it is collected in a specially designed surface unit, then the belt goes again underground and the cycle is repeated.

The concept of efficiency we embed in HOOS technology translates in practice

• We will increase production time - because HOOS is not affected by downtime caused by heavy, sandy, high GOR oil types
• We will pay special attention to reducing:
  • Workover costs - because there is virtually no underground equipment that needs maintenance
  • Necessary equipment to operate - no pumping, no tubing, no strings, no rigs or heavy equipment
  • Energy consumption - we just need the energy to lift the oil, plus a very small additional energy to rotate and squeeze the belt
  • Downtime - the equipment is featured with own smart operating system, able to mail, SMS, alert in real time any known issue

All this research and development effort will give you the following results

• You will reduce energy costs with as much as 95% (as demonstrated in a practical test in Demjen field, light oil with high paraffin: the lifting energy has been reduced from 1MWh to 0.085 MWh per tonne)
• You will significantly increase production, in some cases even several times (the more difficult the environment, the more efficient HOOS it is – our best result is from 200l to 860l, that is four times)
• You will be able to measure in real time your production (provided that the oil is still liquid after we lift it)
• You will slash your operating expenses with at least 50%
• You will be able to operate HOOS from your desk and even from your mobile, while preparing for a management meeting (we did operated HOOS in Cosoaia/Videle while attending last summer World Rugby Championship in London)

In order to achieve previous listed results, HOOS is made of the following modules

• Digital oilfield technology:
  • Internet enabled management tools: dedicated software application, database and VPN security channels designed to protect, monitor, control and properly report your HOOS units activities, whatever their physical locations. Hosted at http://hoos.energy. Can be located on your premises
  • Operating System: a combination of embedded software, computing power, hardware protections (HOOS unit, HSSE), sensors and electrical engine controllers designed to operate and optimize your HOOS activities
• Surface unit: ATEX certified, computer designed mechanics to drive your unit and collect the production. Featured with custom designed blow-up preventer.
• Integrated heating unit so the equipment will work even at temperatures below -30 degrees Celsius.
• Measurement unit: real time production measurement, primary oil/water separation, pumping to park
• Downhole unit: active unit with special design to allow production stimulation, oil flow, unit anchoring, optimal belt tensioning and temporary viscosity reduction for proper vertical transportation.

As mentioned before, HOOS is not affected by crude composition that reduce efficiency, such as sandy oil, viscous oil, high paraffin or high GOR oil types. We have designed the technology to perform in these special conditions. As shown in the following graphic, although not designed for high volume production wells nor for low viscosity oil types, HOOS is best suited for high impurities, high viscosity and/or high GOR oil types:

Being designed to properly produce in harsh oil conditions, HOOS has a clear efficiency advantage comparing to pumping technologies. One key result we’ve got regarding energy efficiency is the power consumption reduction from 1MWh down to 0.065 MWh while significantly increasing to production too. As shown in the efficiency web below, HOOS efficiency is best when applied to sandy oil, oil with paraffin, viscous or high GOR oil types:

This increase efficiency translates into important cost reductions: you significantly decrease your energy costs, you reduce drastically workover and you permanently drop costs with pumps, tubing, strings. As shown in the following graphic, while for traditional pump based technologies the cost per bbl increase with well impurities or viscosity, HOOS costs per bbl steadily decrease. The more viscous or sandy the oil, the lower the lifting costs per bbl, relative to traditional technologies.

And as a practical demonstration of HOOS efficiency level, please find below a graph representing HOOS results from a fine-tuning period , light oil, high paraffin, low GOR, sandy, marginal well.

Closely linked to the hardware there is a Well Operating System, made of computers, sensors and command and control equipment that monitor and record every parameter of the running equipment: instantaneous production, power consumption, belt speed, temperatures and so on, sending all this data through a secure VPN to a central cloud server able to analyse and display it.

The cloud server makes a round offer from our HOOS technology, featuring GIS positioning, contextual menus, operating calendar, intelligent schedules, workflows, just in time alerts, production history and cost forecast and many other features waiting for you to discover and help you boost your profitability.

Should you require more information about the technology itself - lifting equipment, operating system, digital oilfield components - we would be glad to answer your questions. Contact us by email at office@glit.ro.