Research Papers/Topics in Petroleum Engineering

Gas Flaring in Nigeria: What Can be Done to Curb It by Cynthia Ohaeri

GAS FLARING in Nigeria, the burning of natural gas associated with oil extraction, has been a prevalent practice. Natural gas brought to the surface, especially where there is no infrastructure to put this “associated gas” to productive use is burnt for disposal thus making it a wasteful and generally polluting practice. An economy that promotes carbon emission through flaring wastes valuable energy products, increases health disparities and fuels climate change, a far-cry from the Glob...

Silicia Nanoparticles for Enhancing the Performance of Waterflooding in Oil Reservoirs

Silica nanoparticles (SNPs) have been widely utilized in the oil and gas industry to improve different processes, such as in drilling operations, well cementing job, workover operations, wastewater remediation, and most importantly enhance oil recovery. Due to their particle sizes which ranges between 1 and 100 nm, large specific surface area, high dispersibility and tunable physico-chemical properties, they have the capability to alter the wettability of the reservoir rock and reduce the int...

Forecasting Oil Production Rates for Oil Wells Using Decline Curve Analysis and Polynomial Regression Model

In the course of employing decline curves to predict future oil production rates, there is a need to first determine the initial flowrate which often times presents an extent of difficulty especially for harmonic and hyperbolic decline trends. Conventional methods of initial flowrate determination require extrapolation of charts on study or spreadsheets which is time consuming. It is therefore essential to provide an algorithm that would help speed up initial flowrate calculations. This study...

Development and Performance Analysis of Compressed Natural Gas as Transport Fuel for Automobiles in Nigeria

ABSTRACT Development and performance analysis of compressed natural gas (CNG) as a transportation fuel for automobiles in Nigeria are presented. The study involved compositional analysis of natural gas obtained from the product sales point at a treatment plant about 10km off the Port Harcourt-Onitsha route chosen to ensure standard sales gas specifications, design of the gas pipeline network and the refuelling stations requirement and locations. Using field investigations and developed physi...

Estimating Some Mechanical Properties of Rock From In-Situ Rebound Values (A Case Study of Oreke Open Pit Quarry)

ABSTRACT The research deals with estimating some mechanical properties of rock from in-situ rebound value in Oreke open pit quarry ,N-Type  Schmidt rebound hammer data were collected from Oreke open pit .the data were collected with the view to ascertain the suitability of Schmidt hammer for quick ,cheap and less cumber some estimation of the uniaxial compressive strength of marble .The data collection was strictly carried out by ASTM and suggested equation by different authors. UNIAXIAL CO...

Drilling Cost Optimization for Extended Reach Deep Wells Using Artificial Neural Networks

Abstract Global Petroleum reserves are currently getting depleted. Most of the newly discovered oil and gas fields are found in unconventional reserves. Hence there has arisen a need to drill deeper wells in offshore locations and in unconventional reservoirs. The depth and difficulty of drilling terrains has led to drilling operations incurring higher cost due to drilling time. Rate of Penetration is dependent on the several parameters such as: rotary speed(N), Weight-On-Bit, bit state, form...

Optimum Artificial Lift Selection for Condensate Gas Well

The reservoir characteristics of the gas condensate well is special and the changes of the behavior of the well have a significant impact to the production rate. When we do a proper optimization that can lower the operating costs, maximizing HC recovery and the net present value of a project can be increased. The optimization of the well level can be accomplished by adjusting well parameters such as tubing size, wellhead and the skin factor. All of these parameters were investigated with the ...

The Economics Of Crude Oil Stabilization

ABSTRACT Estimating the gas/VOC emissions from oil and gas producing equipments has been a goal which the industry and regulatory agencies have spent a great deal of study and effort to contend with. This research estimated the flashing losses of gas/VOC emission from conventional atmospheric storage tanks to the atmosphere using Vasquez-Beggs Equation (VBE). Using VBE confirmed observed losses experienced in the industry as is represented in a graph showing the losses. It went further to qu...

Effects Of Liquid Holdup On Hydrocarbon Production In Tapered Tubing String Using Niger Delta Fluid Properties

Abstract Effects of liquid holdup on hydrocarbon production in tapered tubing string using Niger Delta fluid properties was undertaken in this work. Oil reservoir fluids flow to the surface as a multicomponent fluid in pipes during production. Multiphase flow occurs due to the density of different phases involved in reservoir fluid and each fluid phase flow at different velocity. In this study, analytically developed equations and existing fluid correlations were used for determination of pr...

Economic Analysis And Application Of Single Point Gas Lift Systems For Marginal Fields Of The Niger Delta

ABSTRACT The purpose of this study is to develop an innovative technique for optimized gas lift design for marginal fields of the Niger Delta. This study used well data from mature fields located southwest of the Niger Delta to develop optimized gas lift design techniques using the single point continuous gas lift approach. A total of fifty-nine (59) wells from the fields were selected for preliminary screening as potential gas lift candidates. The screening process involved; reviewing well ...

Development Of Predictive Models For Diffusion Rate Of Spilled Crude Oil In Niger Delta Soils

ABSTRACT Simplified predictive numerical models have been developed for diffusion rate of crude oil spilled into Niger Delta soils. The proposed model equations were developed using Fourier transformation, and Green’s function. The induction principles as well as the indicial matrix method of dimensional analysis were adopted in determining the functional parameters that could possibly influence their diffusion rates. These mathematical models correctly predict one – dimensional longitud...

Development Of Drilling Fluid From Biomaterials

ABSTRACT New Biodegradable drilling fluids were developed using Brachystegia eurycoma (achi), Detarium microcarpum (ofo) and Pleurotus (osu). The drilling properties such as yield point, apparent viscosity, low shear rate yield point and fluid loss were determined.The field polymer muds that are currently in use namely; PAC-R and PAC-L were formulated and used as control samples to the new proposed product. Herschel –Buckley model was used to obtain the yield stress. Cutting transport rati...

Comparative Economic Analysis Of Compressed Natural Gas And Automotive Gas Oil As Automobile Fuels

ABSTRACT Comparative economic analysis of the use of compressed natural gas (CNG) and the use of AGO for power generation was presented. The data for costs of constructing and running CNG-powered vehicles were obtained for the study. Separate economic analyses of running the CNG-powered vehicles and running AGO vehicles were performed. The initial capital cost for CNG project amounted to N4.31 million and that for diesel was N3.60 million while the annual operating cost for CNG is N1.47 mill...

Characterization Of Nigerian Crude Oil Wax

ABSTRACT Flow assurance is the efficient and successful flow of fluids in pipes. Some of the flow assurance challenges that can be encountered include hydrate formation, which is prevalent offshore, sand deposition, wax precipitation, scale deposits, or emulsion problems. In onshore production facilities in the Niger delta, wax deposition is the major challenge to efficient fluid flow. Consequently, it has been the focus of research to proffer effective predictive control measures to a probl...

A Novel Approach For Estimating Critical Rate And Horizontal Well Placement In Oil Rim Reservoirs

ABSTRACT Coning tendencies in oil rim reservoirs pose serious hindrance to optimizing oil production in the thin oil beds as unwanted fluids tend to replace the oil in the production stream, which invariably limits the ultimate oil recovery. In this study, a semi-analytical method of estimating critical production rate (qoc) and optimum horizontal well placement (hopt) was developed for reservoirs with thin oil zones sandwiched between gas cap and bottom water. Also, proxy models was generat...


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