Documentos de Académico
Documentos de Profesional
Documentos de Cultura
H Holm
Statoil ASA, Norway
ABSTRACT
The subsea gas development in Block 2 offshore Tanzania described in this paper is
characterized by water depths of up to 2600 meters and tie-back distance to shore of
around 100 km. The seabed outside East Africa consists of deep, large scale canyons
and steep inclinations towards shore. The reservoir fluids contain very little condensate
and the pipeline flow is typically low liquid loading conditions at high water fractions.
The key focus of the work presented at the previous BHR conference in 2015 was related
to liquid accumulation. However, this work also revealed that
The key focus of these presentations is hence related to frictional pressure drop in low
liquid loading at high water fractions.
Also, as part of value improvement process the Tanzania project has evaluated
replacement of the subsea Wet Gas Meters with a Virtual Metering System only. A study
was conducted to evaluate the expected accuracy and uncertainties of a model based
Virtual Flow Metering system (VFM) for Tanzania specific operating conditions.
Reliable prediction of pressure drop is crucial for such a system.
This paper gives an overview of the Tanzania deep water gas development with focus on
the flow assurance challenges relating to a potential subsea to beach concept and the
background, motivation and high level results from the conducted work, while the
“three-phase vertical flow experiments (SINTEF)”, the model development and
verification (Schlumberger) and the Virtual Metering study (FMC) are presented in detail
in separate papers.
The Tanzania Gas Project (TGP) is located in Block 2 approximately 100km offshore
Tanzania in East Africa. Locations of the Block 2 discoveries are shown in Figure 1.
Statoil Tanzania AS is the operator in Block 2 with 65% interest, with ExxonMobil as a
partner with 35% interest. Shell is the operator of blocks 1, 3 and 4.
As of 1Q 2017, eight reservoirs have been discovered in Block 2: Zafarani, Lavani Main,
Lavani Deep, Tangawizi, Mronge, Mdalasini, Giligiliani and Piri.
Block 4
Block 3
Block 1
2 FIELD DEVELOPMENT
The seabed outside East Africa is characterized by deep water and large scale canyons
and channels (see Figure 2) that challenge pipeline technology and canyons crossings.
Water depth at the field is ranging from 2,200 to 2,600 metres.
The field consists of several reservoirs with different reservoir conditions and different
reservoir fluids.
The selected development concept for Tanzania Block 2 is a subsea production system
tied back to an onshore LNG facility via a multiphase phase flow pipeline system.
The field layout and large scale seabed topography is illustrated in Figure 2.
The long distance subsea tie-back to shore development of Tanzania Block 2 introduces
some new challenges compared to previous subsea tie-backs such as Ormen Lange (ref
/1/) and Snøhvit (ref /2/) in the North Sea:
• Water depth (~2,500 metres), but «significant» local differences in water depth at
the field;
• Large scale topography – smooth, but steep inclinations (+4 to +5 degrees) due to
water depth;
• Steep escarpment in near shore area (20-30 degrees);
• High surface sea water temperature (+30 oC);
• Commingled production from in-homogenous reservoirs (P, T, CGR);
• Low liquid loading;
• Risk of formation water.
Although the seabed in between the large scale canyons is quite benign, the pipeline is
quite steep due to the water depth. Typical pipeline inclinations are +4 to +5 degrees.
Locally and at the steep escarpment next to shore it may be even steeper. However, the
uncertainties often introduced to the multiphase modelling due to large uncertainties in
the pipeline profile are negligible in our case.
The sea water surface temperature is approximately 30 oC while the sea water
temperature in deep water is down to +3 to +4 oC. Hence the gas temperature will first
cool down to approximately +3 oC and then start to increase when approaching shore,
depending on the pipeline configuration (coating, trenched w/wo backfill, burial etc.).
The onshore arrival temperature may hence be as high as +20 to +30 oC.
The individual flowing wellhead pressures depend on initial reservoir pressure, in-place
gas volumes, reservoir properties, timing of starting production and the depletion of each
reservoir/gas offtake from each reservoir. In addition, aquifer with corresponding
pressure support may influence the pressure development differently in the individual
reservoirs. The challenge is to establish a production strategy that ensures that all wells
maintain the minimum flowing wellhead pressure required to flow to shore without
offshore pressure support (compression) as long as possible, and at the same time
maintain production within the operational envelope of all infield flow lines and the
pipeline to shore.
Large differences in reservoir temperatures lead to large variation in gas water saturation
and MEG injection requirements, which again leads to large variations in the water cut /
aqueous phase volumetric flow rate in the infield flow lines and multiphase pipeline to
shore as a function of production rate from each reservoir.
Large differences in flowing wellhead pressures also impose some challenges on the
MEG injection system. All wells are served from the same MEG injection system and a
common MEG injection pressure, and hence the MEG injection pressure need to be high
enough to serve the strongest wells, leading to high differential pressures across the
MEG dosage valves (up to approximately 350 bara) which may introduce challenges
with respect to controllability of the MEG injection rates depending on the final type of
dosage valves.
Potential variations in condensate to gas ratio (CGR) between the reservoirs will,
together with the variations in water/MEG flow rates, influence the liquid loading of the
The selected subsea system architecture has limited operational flexibility to handle
these aspects, and hence a more stringent production strategy combined with robust
operational procedures is required.
As a consequence of the very dry reservoir fluids and the steep inclinations the flow in
the in-field flow lines and the pipeline to shore will operate at conditions where multiple
holdup solutions may exist. This phenomenon introduces challenges when it comes to
multiphase flow modelling and the reliability of the flow models to predict liquid
accumulation, which was the main topic of the presentations at the 17th International
Conference on Multiphase Production Technology, 2015 ( ref /14/, /15/, /16/, /17/ and
/18/.
The combined effect of very low content of condensate combined with relatively high
reservoir temperature / high water saturation of the gas results in high water cuts at
typical pipeline operating conditions. Experiments carried out both in 8’’ near horizontal
pipe and in a 4-inch ID 50m-high riser at the SINTEF Large Scale Multiphase Flow
Laboratory in Norway revealed interesting and unexpected phenomena with respect to
frictional pressure drop for high water fractions. This is the key topic of this paper and is
further discussed in chapter 5, and in ref /18/ and /20/.
Typical operational conditions along Tanzania pipelines at friction dominated flow rates
in terms of local water cut and superficial liquid velocities are shown in Figure 8.
Maximum condensate dropout for the different reservoirs fluid occurs at low pressures,
typically 50-60 bara (ref Figure 3) i.e very little condensate exists at the inlet of the
pipeline. This, in combination with high reservoir temperature / high water saturation
and MEG injection, results in high water cuts at the pipeline inlet decreasing along the
pipeline as condensate condenses from the gas. The actual production may be any
combination of the different reservoir fluids. Hence the three-phase effects needed to be
investigated in a systematically manner, as will be further discussed in chapter 5.
Some of the reservoirs seem have a strong aquifer and a potential risk of water
breakthrough. Potential production of formation water is a challenge with respect MEG
injection capacity, MEG recovery, liquid accumulation in the pipeline / operational
envelope of total production system and reduced gas production. The formation water
handling strategy is summarized in chapter 4.4.
150
100
NOTES:
1) Temperature: +5 C
50
0
-100 -50 0 50 100 150 0 50 100 150 200 250
Temperature (C) Pressure (bara)
0,010 1,0
Watercut 0,9
0,008 0,8
Superficial velocity (m/s)
0,7
Superficial velocity Liquid
Watercut (%)
0,006 0,6
0,5
0,004 0,4
Superficial velocity water+MEG
0,3
0,1
0,000 0,0
0 20000 40000 60000 80000 100000
Distance (m)
Figure 4 Typical superficial liquid velocities and local water cut along the pipeline
at 100% flow. (At reduced flowrates and/or other combinations of reservoir fluids,
the superficial liquid velocities may be significantly lower or higher)
As the key focus are of this paper is related to flow modelling and verification of the
flow modelling, the key flow assurance strategies are only briefly described in the
following. In general, the flow assurance strategies are quite similar to other
gas/condensate tie-backs.
The overall hydrate management strategy is to prioritize hydrate prevention, rather than
remediation as hydrate remediation in this kind of water depth may be challenging.
Operational pigging of the infield flow lines may be eliminated by utilizing Corrosion
Resistant Alloy (CRA) line pipe for all infield flow lines, which is being considered.
The primary liquid holdup management strategy is to operate within the operational
envelope(s) of the in-field flow lines and the multiphase pipeline(s) to shore.
Minimum turndown of the subsea production system is affected by the pipeline operating
pressure. Onshore pre-compression will be installed late life primarily for plateau
extension, but it will also improve the turndown flexibility during tail-end production.
The MEG injection and recovery system design with respect to formation water handling
capacity is based on expected formation water detection accuracy including a certain
design margin.
5.1.1 General
Reliable multiphase flow simulations are crucial for development as the Tanzania Gas
Development Project.
Experience and results from the flow model verification work carried out by the
Tanzania Gas Development Project ( /14/,/15/,/16/,/17/,/18/,/19/,/20/,/22/) revealed the
following key challenges related to multiphase flow and multiphase flow modelling in
the low liquid loading domain:
However, one of the key conclusions from this work was that the OLGAHD was proven
to be the most suitable flow model compared to the “standard OLGA”, and hence
selected as the preferred flow model for the Tanzania Gas Project. The “standard
OLGA” was shown to have several weaknesses for low liquid loading and steep
inclinations compared to the OLGAHD model, while the OLGAHD after tuning of the
model showed excellent results with respect to liquid accumulation, both for two-phase
flow and three-phase flow conditions (ref Figure 7).
Based on this work, the uncertainties in predictions of the liquid accumulation in the
pipelines to shore for the Tanzania Gas Project (ref Figure 5) were significantly reduced.
250 10000
240 NOTES:
1) Mchinga route, 26" nom 9000
230 2) Zafarani + Lavani mixture
220 4) OLGA 7.2 OLGAHD 8000
210
200 Operational envelope 7000
180
5000
170
160 Gravity Friction 4000
150
3000
140
130 2000
120 Liquid holdup
(condensate + water + MEG) 1000
110
100 0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
Gas (MSm3/sd)
Multiple
holdup
region Middle
Low
Figure 6 Multiple holdup region and liquid accumulation point in flow with low
liquid loading
5.1.3 Three-phase flow effects on the frictional pressure drop at high superficial
gas velocities
However, during the low liquid loading liquid accumulation experimental campaign
some experiments were also extended to include high superficial gas velocities in order
to obtain some pressure drop measurements (ref Figure 8). These experiments showed
some unexpected three-phase flow effects. The experiments showed that the frictional
pressure drop were significantly higher in three-phase flow than for both two-phase
gas/oil and two-phase gas/water flows. However, these three-phase effects were not
captured by any of the existing OLGA models. The OLGA models, including OLGAHD
Three different kind of trends where defined for the experimental campaign:
The results are summarized in Figure 9, and explained in detail in ref /19/ and /20/.
• Experiments show that frictional pressure drop increases significantly with high
water fractions, compared to two-phase flow;
• the OLGA models were not able to capture the three-phase effects on frictional
pressure drop;
• The OLGAHD model under predicts the frictional pressure drop in horizontal three-
phase flow at high water cut;
• The OLGA model over predicts the frictional pressure drop in vertical three-phase
flow at high water cut;
• Little experimental data exist for such conditions (low liquid loading three-phase
flow at high superficial gas velocities).
One can then ask the following question: Why has nobody seen this before?
Fluid composition – three-phase flow effect is most significant for low liquid
loading and high water cut. The reservoir fluids in existing gas/condensate fields
like Ormen Lange and Snøhvit contains much more condensate and hence the
water cut is low (ref Figure 11), while the Tanzania reservoir fluids contains very
little condensate combined with high reservoir temperatures/ water saturation
plus continuous MEG injection give high water cuts.
Limited relevant laboratory data available. (Most existing experimental data is
two-phase flow data).
Oil companies have «tuned» the hydraulic roughness to match the measured
pressure drop prior to releasing the field data to OVIP / Schlumberger. i.e. the
discrepancy has been «hidden».
MEG
Water
Condensate
Liquid fraction (g/kg)
Ormen Lange Snøhvit Troll Shtokman J0 Shtokman J1 Zafarani Lavani Lavani Deep Piri Tangawizi
The multiphase flow is characterized by low liquid loading and steep inclinations at
conditions where multiple liquid holdup solutions may exist.
One of the key flow assurance challenges is reliable prediction of liquid accumulation
and three-phase flow effects on the frictional pressure drop.
A large experimental campaign has been carried out at the SINTEF Multiphase Flow
Laboratory focusing on the transition from low to high holdup at large diameter, low
liquid loading flow at conditions where multiple holdup solutions exist.
The OLGAHD has been proven to be the most suitable flow model, and hence has been
selected as the preferred flow model for the Tanzania Gas Project. However,
• Experiments show that frictional pressure drop increases significantly with high
water fractions, compared to two-phase flow;
• The OLGA models were not able to capture the three-phase effects on frictional
pressure drop;
• The OLGAHD model under predicts the frictional pressure drop in horizontal three-
phase flow at high water cut;
• The OLGA model over predicts the frictional pressure drop in vertical three-phase
flow at high water cut.
Both the experimental campaign by SINTEF and the theoretical verification work carried
out by Schlumberger have contributed to a significant improvement of the general
understanding of multiphase flow at low liquid loading conditions, and have also
contributed to improved reliability of flow modelling at these conditions. Work is
ongoing to improve the weaknesses observed in flow models.
The details from the experimental campaign and the theoretical work are presented in
separate papers.
7 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The author would like to thank Statoil Tanzania Gas Project for funding this work and
for the permission to publish the results. I would also like to thank Jørn Kjølaas and
Marita Wolden and the rest of the team at the SINTEF Multiphase Flow Laboratory, and
Gunnar Staff, Chris Lawrence and Dag Biberg at Schlumberger for their hard work and
enthusiasm during the work.
8 REFERENCES
/1/ Wilsson A., Overaa. S and Holm, H, “Ormen Lange Flow Assurance Challenges”,
OTC 16555, 2004.
/2/ G S Landsverk, G Flaten, M Svenning, D Pedersen, B H Pettersen, «Multiphase
flow behaviour at Snøhvit”, BHR Group, 14th International Conference on
Multiphase Technology, Cannes, France 2009.