Study and development of pour point depressant for CTC-1 crude oil
Abstract
The Ca Tam field, discovered in August 2014, is located in Block 09-3/12 in the Cuu Long basin approximately 160 km of Vung Tau, Offshore Vietnam and in approximately 60 meters of water. Crude oil from CTC-1 WHP will be transported to RP-2 WHP of Dragon field via 17km subsea pipeline and and then to a Floating Storage Offloading vessel (FSO) via 9.5km insulated production pipeline. The lowest temperature in this pipeline is 30oC, while the pour point temperature (PPT) of CTC-1 crude oil is very high (36oC) due to high paraffin content (20.5%) and high asphaltene and resin content (12.6%). So studying to find a suitable Pour Point Depressant (PPD) for the crude oil is very important. The PPD must have ability to reduce pour point temperature of crude oil from 36oC to 30oC. And the PPD will be injected to downhole via a capillary system where the temperature is very low (below 6oC). So the PPD must have good flow characteristics at low temperature.
The aim of this research is to choose appropriated Polymer – main component of commercial PPD chemical, Paraffin Dispersant and Asphaltene Dispersant and screen to select the best ratio based on the crude oil components (paraffin, asphaltene and resin content and distribution of n-paraffin).
The effeciency of prepared mixture were studied for their capability as PPD and flow improver for CTC-1 crude oil to solve the problem of wax deposition during transportation. The study showed that generaly the prepared mixture were efficient in the role of both pour point depressant and flow improver for the tested crude oil.
The pour point of CTC-1 crude oil reduces 6°C, the viscosity and gel strength of crude at 25°C decreases more than 60%, wax deposition reduces to 69% when treated by prepared mixture (which called FIC 01060) at 1.500ppm.
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