Field Operations & Inlet

Receiving
A.L.SIVAPRIYA

Field operations
Well head operations:
If the gas is nonassociated, hydrocarbon
liquids knocked out in the separator
may be remixed with the gas or stored
in a tank and removed by truck.
Usually, no compression is applied
before the gas is sold.
If the gas is being stripped from oil,
separators knock out both oil and water.

 For high-pressure wells, the oil passes through up to

three separators to recover the light ends.
Because the last-stage separator is near ambient
conditions, the gas may be compressed before it
flows into a gathering line to the gas plant.
Frequently, several wells from one lease are tied to
one separations unit to reduce the number of
separators, compressors, and meters.
This practice is especially true in offshore operations
because producers need to minimize the number of
platforms and platform weight for cost purposes.
Gas dehydration and sometimes dew pointing, that
is, reduction of the amount of heavier hydrocarbons,
is done at lease.

Gas well with condensate tank and

separator

Electronic flow-measurement
transmitting equipment.

Piping:
For offshore production, many wells are tied back to
a platform, and then gas from multiple platforms are
tied together into large pipelines that go to the gas
plant.
Pipelines from onshore wells, especially if operated
by small independent producers, form an extensive
network of small lines from individual wells that tie
into increasingly larger lines.
The smaller gathering lines may be aboveground or
buried, whereas larger lines are always buried.
Aboveground lines are much easier to maintain but
are exposed to the atmosphere.
Surface coating for corrosion prevention and
possibly insulation, may be required.

 Oxygen is an unwelcome component because it

enhances corrosion, adversely affects several plant
processes, and can cause the sales gas to be
subquality if the concentration exceeds 1 vol% .
The oxygen problem is severe enough in some
areas that personnel are dedicated to chasing air
to find the leaks.
They analyze pipeline contents for oxygen and
work back into the field to find the source. Once
found, the line or well is shut down for repairs.
Since the late 1990s, gas processors have installed
SCADA (supervisory control and data acquisition)
systems to monitor both plant and field operations.

Compression station:
Onshore compression station, commonly called a
booster
In addition to compressing the gas to move it
into the gas plant, the stations usually have inlet
suction separators (scrubbers) to remove
condensed liquids.
The condensates are either reinjected
downstream of the compressor discharge or
stored before being trucked to the gas plant.
When required, chemical inhibitors for corrosion
and gas hydrate prevention are injected into the
discharged gas; metering pumps are used to
control injection rates.

Booster station on gathering

system.

 The benefits are higher line capacity,

reduced corrosion rates, and reduced
chemical hydrate and corrosion inhibitor
injection rates.
Reduces potential for large liquid slugs
entering the plant.
Putting liquids back into the pipeline
eliminates the need for tanks and
trucking but increases chemical costs,
puts more importance on good pigging,
and probably increases pipeline
maintenance costs.

Pigging :
Pigging is the process of forcing a solid object through a
pipeline.
The process involves inserting the pig via a pig launcher
into the pipelines and removing it by use of a pig receiver.
Pigging is used to perform any of the following functions:
1. Provide a barrier between liquid products that use the
same pipeline
2. Check wall thickness and find damaged sections of lines
3. Remove debris such as dirt and wax from lines
4. Provide a known volume for calibrating flow meters
5. Coat inner pipe walls with inhibitors
6. Remove condensed hydrocarbon liquids and water in two
phase pipelines

 Field operations must follow a rigorous pigging

schedule to prevent the plant from being hit by
large slugs of liquid that would flood inlet receiving
and carry liquids into the gas-processing units.
Pigs are usually made of polyurethane foam. The
smaller, projectile-shaped pigs are used for
cleaning out soft deposits, gauging lines, and
removing water after a line is hydrotested.
The pig in the center of the back row has metal
brushes for removing hard solids.
The back two pigs on the left are designed for
bidirectional flow.
Larger pigs have a metal mandrel holding the cups
and disks, which can be replaced after wear

Different shapes of foam spheres and

pigs used to clean gathering lines

 Spheres for nominal 2 to 4 inch (50 to 100

mm) diameter lines are solid, whereas larger
ones are inflated, usually with water or
ethylene glycolwater mixtures.
Spheres are launched from a pipe branch that
can be isolated and purged for loading.
Pressure differential drives the sphere through
the line. However, it usually stops
intermittently when it comes to low points
where pools of liquid accumulate.
Field and plant operators learn the typical run
times for spheres in a line, and inline detectors
signal a spheres location.

GAS HYDRATES
A field of technology, called flow
assurance, exists for ensuring that
hydrocarbons flow unimpeded by line
blockage from wells to the point of
processing.
The three areas of concern are:
Wax and asphaltene solids deposition
Scale (inorganic salt) deposition
Gas hydrate solids formation

 For gas gathering systems, wax and asphaltene

deposition is normally not a serious problem and
can be remediated by pigging.
Scale is a common issue at the wellhead but should
not be one in the pipeline.
However, gas hydrates strike fear into the hearts
of flow assurance people for two reasons.
First, hydrate plugs can occur within minutes
without prior warning.
Second, although hydrate formation can be
inhibited in a number of ways, injection pump
failure, separator failure, and process upsets can
suddenly make pipeline contents vulnerable to
hydrate formation.

Properties:
Gas hydrates are a class of solid, non
stoichiometric compounds called
clathrates.
They form when a host material,
water for hydrates through hydrogen
bonding, forms a caged structure
that contains guest molecules, such
as methane.
Gas hydrates should not be
confused with salt hydrates, which
form stoichio-metric compounds.

 Figure 3.7 shows a break in all of the curves at

32F (0C) because the hydrates are in
equilibrium with gas and ice at the lower
temperatures, and with gas and liquid water at
the higher temperatures.
For the ethane hydrate line, an abrupt change
occurs at 57F (14C).
At this point, the hydrate is in equilibrium with
gaseous ethane and both liquid ethane and liquid
water (i.e., the hydrate formation line intersects
the vapor pressure line, which is not shown).
At higher temperatures, the ethane hydrate is in
equilibrium with liquid ethane and liquid water.

Hydrate inhibition:
Three ways exist to avoid hydrate formation in
natural gas streams:
Operate outside the hydrate formation region.
Dehydrate the gas.
Add hydrate inhibitors.
Whenever operating conditions are prone to
hydrate formation and liquid water may form in the
lines, field operations control hydrate formation by
use of chemical inhibitors.
They are added at the wellhead and at booster
stations through positive displacement pumps so
that the addition rate can be accurately controlled.

 Use of chemical inhibitors is the least attractive

hydrate inhibition method for several reasons:
The proper inhibitor dosage must be known to avoid
plugging or needless chemical costs, but oftentimes
it is determined empirically.
The chemical cost, although it is usually a small
fraction of overall operating costs.
The reliability of inhibitor injection can be a problem
because of malfunctioning injection pumps and
depleted inhibitor reservoirs especially at remote
sites.
The possible interaction between hydrate inhibitors
and other additivesreduces the effectiveness of some
of additives, an effect that is usually determined
empirically.

 Chemical hydrate inhibitors come in three types:

1. Antiagglomerates (AA)
2. Kinetic (KHI)
3. Thermodynamic
. Antiagglomerates prevent small hydrate particles
from agglomerating into larger sizes to produce a
plug.
. Kinetic inhibitors slow crystal formation by interfering
with the construction of the cages.
. Their advantage is that they can be used at
concentrations in the 1 wt% range in the aqueous
phase, and they are nonvolatile.
. Their disadvantage is that the proper dosage must
be determined empirically, as too much inhibitor may
enhance hydrate formation rates.

 Thermodynamic inhibitors, mainly methanol

and ethylene glycol, are widely used.
They are essentially antifreeze. Inorganic salts
are effective but rarely used.
The required dosage of thermodynamic
inhibitors is predictable, but the concentrations
can be high, over 50 wt% of the water phase.
A number of empirical correlations, on the
basis of thermodynamic properties of
solutions, predict the amount of any hydrate
inhibitor required to depress hydrate formation
temperatures

INLET RECEIVING
Gas and liquids that enter the gas plant pass emergency
shutdown valves, which isolate the plant from incoming
streams and pig receivers, and then go to inlet receiving,
where condensed phases drop out.
The initial gasliquid separation occurs in a slug catcher.
Slug catchers are critical because downstream gas
processing units rely on a continuous gas stream free of
liquids, even when surges of liquid enter the plant.
A slug catcher is a gas liquid separator sized to hold the
biggest slug a plant will experience.
Depending upon slug catcher design, inlet receiving
handles just slugs or combines slug catching with liquid
storage.

Gas-Liquid Separation
Separator vessel orientation can be
vertical or horizontal.
Vertical separators are most
commonly used when the liquid-togas ratio is low or gas flow rates are
low.
They are preferred offshore because
they occupy less platform area.

 Horizontal separators are favored for large

liquid volumes or if the liquid-to-gas ratio is
high.
Lower gas flow rates and increased residence
times offer better liquid dropout.
The larger surface area provides better
degassing and more stable liquid level as well.
The gas liquid separator indicates the four areas
or types of separation:
1. Primary separation
2. Gravity settling
3. Coalescing
4. Liquid collecting

Primary Separation:
Primary separation is accomplished
by utilizing the difference in
momentum between gas and liquid.
Larger liquid droplets fail to make
the sharp turn and impinge on the
inlet wall.
This action coalesces finer droplets
so that they drop out quickly.

Gravity Settling:
Gravity settling requires low gas velocities with minimal
turbulence to permit droplet fallout. This section
summarizes useful equations for quick estimation of
separator performance.
The calculations assume the droplets to be rigid spheres.
The terminal-settling velocity, VT , for a sphere falling
through a stagnant fluid is governed by particle diameter,
density differences, gas viscosity, and a drag coefficient
that is a function of both droplet shape and Reynolds
number.
Here the Reynolds number is defined as
NRe = DPVT g /g,
where DP is particle diameter, g is the density, and g is
the viscosity.

Coalescing:
The coalescing section contains an insert that forces the
gas through a tortuous path to bring small mist particles
together as they collect on the insert.
These inserts can be mesh pads, vane packs, or cyclonic
devices lists some of the features of the wire mesh and
vane pack mist extractors.
Cyclonic devices are proprietary devices, and features are
application dependent.
Mesh pads are either wire or knitted mesh, usually about 6
inches (15 cm) thick, and, preferably, are mounted
horizontally with upward gas flow, but they can be vertical.
They loose effectiveness if tilted. Mesh pads tend to be
more
effective at mist removal than vane packs but are subject
to plugging by solids and heavy oils.

Liquid Collection:
The liquid collection section acts as a holder for the
liquids removed from the gas in the above three
separation sections.
This section also provides for degassing of the
liquid and for water and solids separation from the
hydrocarbon phase.
The most common solid is iron sulfide from
corrosion, which can interfere with the liquidliquid
separation.
If a large amount of water is present, separators
often have a boot, as shown in the horizontal
separator, at the bottom of the separator for the
water to collect.

Liquid liquid separators

Liquidliquid separators are similar to
gasliquid separators, and the
configuration depends upon whether the
separator has two or three phases present.
A coalescing screen may be in the liquid
section to coalesce the droplets.
If a vapor phase is not present, the
mixture enters at one end, goes through a
coalescing medium, and then enters the
section where gravity separation occurs.

Slug catcher configurations:

Two kinds of slug catchers are
manifolded piping and inlet vessels.
The most difficult part of a slug
catcher design is the proper sizing.
Sizing requires knowledge of the
largest expected liquid slug, as liquid
pump discharge capacity on the slug
catcher will be trivial compared with
the sudden liquid influx.

1. Manifolded piping:
. One reason piping is used instead of separators
is to minimize vessel wall thickness.
. This feature makes piping attractive at
pressures above 500 psi (35 bar).
. The simplest slug-catcher design is a singlepipe design that is an increased diameter on
the inlet piping.
. Manifolded piping is strictly for catching liquid
slugs, demisters are usually installed
downstream in scrubbers.
. Liquid goes to other vessels, where degassing
and hydrocarbonwater separation occurs.

2. Inlet vessels:
These slug catchers, commonly called inlet receivers, are simply
gasliquid separators that combine slug catching with liquid
storage.
Horizontal vessels are preferred, unless area is limited (as on
offshore platforms), because they provide the highest liquid
surface area.
Usually two or three vessels are manifolded together to permit
larger volumes and to allow servicing of one vessel without plant
disruption.
Length-to-diameter ratios are typically 3:1 to 5:1 to maintain a low
gas velocity through the gravity-settling section.
With their large volume, inlet vessels usually act as primary
storage for inlet liquids as well.
The vessels can accommodate demisters, so additional separation
may be unnecessary before the gas goes to compression.

SAFETY AND ENVIRONMENTAL

CONSIDERATIONS
Some common safety issues involved with field operations
include the following:
Leaking pipelines. Leaks present a danger of fire if an
ignition source is available and of poisoning if the gas
contains high hydroge sulfide concentrations. Respirators
may be required for work in a sour gas field.
Plugged pipelines. Plugs can be caused by solids
blockage, such as hydrates or, occasionally, a stuck pig.
Clearing a hydrate plug should be done by depressurization
of both sides of the plug to prevent it from dislodging and
becoming a projectile that potentially damages the line.
Another consideration is the impact of liquid slugs on the
piping. Often, inlet slug catching equipment is designed to
field codes, which allow thinner piping than would be used
in a gas processing plant

 From an environmental perspective, the most

obvious problem is leaking pipelines.
Berms are required around the storage tanks to
prevent soil contamination; in the case of
methanol, the potential for fire exists as well.
A major issue is control of exhausts from
compressors.
Sulfur removal or sulfur oxide emissions may be
required.
Rich gas in gathering systems can to be heavier
than air at lower temperatures, which makes
venting hazardous.
If the gas is sour, configurations that permit the gas
to go to flares may be required.