In a Reuters article, Forget fracking. Choking, lifting latest efforts to stem U.S. shale bust, Andrew Slaughter, director for the Deloitte Center for Energy Solutions stated:
Production optimization is going to be the next phase of the shale revolution… The low price environment will give companies and operators a chance to take stock of the techniques that work.
One of the ways to optimize oil and gas production is to get better subsurface and surface pressure and temperature measurements to improve many aspects from artificial lift optimization to real-time reservoir and topside production monitoring.
I caught up with Emerson’s Joe Kitzman and he shared some of the high pressure and temperature measurement devices commonly used to support these areas of optimization. Joe joined Emerson as a result of the Emerson acquisition of Paine Electronics.These pressure and temperature sensors are designed for extreme and corrosive applications such as downhole well bores, deepwater, deserts and even space travel.
For example, these instruments are used in applications such as downhole pump pressure inflow measurements, downhole tools (measurement while drilling, logging while drilling & wireline), perforation and completion tools, subsea manifolds, blowout preventers and more. High pressure/high temperature (HP/HT) sensors support applications over 40,000PSI (275MPA) and 600degF (316degC).
These devices are used in other applications such as monitoring fluid pressure pumped to the surface and the temperature of the physical pump in steam-assisted gravity drainage (SAGD) in the oil sands production sites.
At the offshore platform or well pad surface facilities, these HP/HT instruments are used in high-resolution pressure and temperature measurements used in determining well and field performance; confirming reserve volume and estimations. For the surface control valves, these devices are used to control unwanted water and gas, minimize well interventions, and maximize well productivity.
For shale producers, the HP/HT devices are used in hydraulic fracturing (fracking) operations to monitor high-pressure hydraulic tool measurements, wellbore injection pressure and temperature from the hydraulic tool.
For more on some of the specific models and application fits, visit the downhole pressure & temperature measurement solutions and subsea measurement solutions pages.
If you’re going to the Offshore Technology Conference (OTC 2016), join us to see these solutions and others in the NRG Center booth 5817.
You can also connect and interact with other oil & gas, pressure and temperature measurement experts in the Oil & Gas, Pressure and Temperature groups in the Emerson Exchange 365 community.