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Surface Production
Operations
Design of Oil Handling
Systems and Facilities
Ken Arnold
AMEC Paragon, Houston, Texas
Maurice Stewart
President, Stewart Training Company

THIRD EDITION

AMSTERDAM • BOSTON • HEIDELBERG • LONDON

NEW YORK • OXFORD • PARIS • SAN DIEGO
SAN FRANCISCO • SINGAPORE • SYDNEY • TOKYO

Gulf Professional Publishing is an imprint of Elsevier

vi Contents

Fields with Different Flowing Tubing Pressures 34

Determining Separator Operating Pressures 36
Two-Phase vs. Three-Phase Separators 37
Process Flowsheet 37
Oil Treating and Storage 37
Lease Automatic Custody Transfer (LACT) 40
Pumps 44
Water Treating 44
Compressors 44
Gas Dehydration 48
Well Testing 50
Gas Lift 53
Offshore Platform Considerations 56
Overview 56
Modular Construction 57
Equipment Arrangement 57

3 Basic Principles 61
Introduction 61
Basic Oil-Field Chemistry 61
Elements, Compounds, and Mixtures 61
Atomic and Molecular Weights 62
Hydrocarbon Nomenclature 63
Paraffin Series: (Cn H2n+2 ) 64
Paraffin Compounds 64
Acids and Bases 65
Fluid Analysis 65
Physical Properties 65
Molecular Weight and Apparent Molecular Weight 68
Example 3-1: Molecular weight calculation 69
Example 3-2: Determine the apparent molecular weight of
dry air, which is a gas mixture consisting of nitrogen, oxygen,
and small amounts of Argon 69
Gas Specific Gravity and Density 70
Example 3-3: Calculate the specific gravity of a natural gas
with the following composition 71
Nonideal Gas Equations of State 73
Reduced Properties 80
Example 3-4: Calculate the pseudo-critical temperature
and pressure for the following natural gas stream
composition 81
Example 3-5: Calculate the volume of 1 lb mole of the natural
gas stream given in the previous example at 120  F
and 1500 psia 82
 Contents vii

Example 3-6: A sour natural gas has the following composition.

Determine the compressibility factor for the gas at 100  F
and 1000 psia 88
Liquid Density and Specific Gravity 89
Viscosity 92
Gas Viscosity 93
Liquid Viscosity 94
Oil-Water Mixture Viscosity 95
Phase Behavior 97
System Components 98
Single-Component Systems 99
Multicomponent Systems 101
Lean Gas Systems 103
Rich Gas Systems 103
Retrograde Systems 104
Application of Phase Envelopes 105
Black Oil Reservoir 106
Phase Diagram Characteristics 106
Field Characteristics 106
Laboratory Analysis 107
Volatile Oil Reservoir 107
Phase Diagram Characteristics 107
Field Characteristics 108
Laboratory Analysis 109
Retrograde Gas Reservoir 109
Phase Diagram Characteristics 109
Field Characteristics 110
Laboratory Analysis 110
Wet Gas Reservoir 110
Phase Diagram Characteristics 110
Field Characteristics 111
Dry Gas Reservoir 112
Phase Diagram Characteristics 112
Information Required for Design 112
Flash Calculations 113
Characterizing the Flow Stream 130
Molecular Weight of Gas 130
Gas Flow Rate 130
Liquid Molecular Weight 132
Specific Gravity of Liquid 133
Liquid Flow Rate 134
The Flow Stream 135
Approximate Flash Calculations 136
Other Properties 137
Exercises 142
References 149