Flow Assurance has always been a major component in our service offering. It concerns itself with all the issues important to maintaining the flow of oil gas from reservoir to reception facilities. This core area of expertise is complimented by access to other disciplines such as subsea equipment design (mechanical design, materials selection, riser analysis, etc), process engineering, safety and risk assessment. As a result, OSL’s view of Flow Assurance is not an add-on but an integrated part of the field development solution we provide.
Our Flow Assurance service is applied across the life cycle of a development starting with a good understanding and model representation of the production fluid, through equipment design, operations support and production enhancement. This “full cycle” Flow Assurance input is essential to minimise the risk of production losses due to inadequate design or operational issues.
OSL's Integrated Flow Assurance Offering
We regularly get involved in the following:
Fluid Analysis
- Key to a robust production system design and identification of any operational issues
- Prediction of solids precipitation and identify risk of wax, hydrates, asphaltene and scale
- Fluid characterisation and model development - carbon number distribution, physical property, phase behaviour and laboratory experiment matching
Flow Assurance input to Field Development Option Screening
- Flowline/Pipeline Sizing to determine hydraulically optimal option over field life
- Flowline/Pipeline thermal performance and management strategy
- Provide input to spool/jumper, manifold, riser, cooling spools (for HT system), HIPPS (for HP systems), subsea choke design, etc
- Identify and evaluate management of any operational risks (slugging, wax, hydrates, etc)
- Input to subsea cost estimation
Flow Assurance input to Operations
- Slugging study - slug prediction, operational impact and management/mitigation
- Pigging studies
- Chemical Injection Studies
Wax Management
- Wax prediction using advanced PVT packages
- Wax deposition studies - prediction of deposition rates accounting for fluid rheology changes
- Pigging studies - recommendation of pigging frequency, operational support for pigging campaign, etc
Hydrate Management
- Hydrate prediction and prevention
- Hydrate Remediation
- Development of operating philosophy for preservation of subsea production components (flowline, riser, jumpers, wells and manifold) against hydrate formation
- Transient studies - shutdown/cooldown, blowdown and production restart analysis
Integrated Production System Dynamic Simulation Studies
- Integrated production system model from completion to facilities - a cost-effective way of assessing the impact of subsea or topsides modifications on overall system operability
- Pressure transient processes for valve response (e.g. HIPPS definition), water hammer, emergency shutdown, etc
