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Linkage of Carbonate Field’s Hydrocarbon Migration History including De-asphalting Process with Asphaltene Flow Assurance
- Publisher: European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers
- Source: Conference Proceedings, EAGE Workshop on Petroleum Geochemistry in Operations and Production, Oct 2016, Volume 2016, p.1 - 4
Abstract
This work was motivated for establishing a robust asphaltene flow assurance engineering in unique carbonate oil field where encountered a contradictory asphaltene precipitating risk distribution in which asphaltene onset pressure (AOP) could be detected from some locations but not from others. At first, a quick analysis was performed to solve this contradiction by applying a general engineering rule-of thumbs (based on compositional gradients and sampling horizons dependency); however, the effort could not succeed to provide appropriate understanding into the probable reasons of the AOP result variations. Then, more wide views were applied to our assessment through a multidisciplinary discussion taking participation from engineers to geoscientists. This made an effective synergy between them to seek a missing link to the contradictory AOP results. The engineer’s perspective focusing on the current fluid equilibrium was tied in the geoscientist’s perspective covering the geologic time of hydrocarbon migration. Consequently, the re-assessment succeeded in explaining of relationship in heterogeneous distributions of asphaltene precipitating risks and solid bitumen occurrence as two sides of the same coin. Because solid bitumen deposits were results of de-asphalting, consequently, higher asphaltene precipitating risks in liquid was considered identical to less solid bitumen deposition during hydrocarbon migration history.