A study of continuous flow gas lift system using Cfd

Abstract

Gas lift optimization has been a point of interest for some decades in order to increase production in oil fields. Despite that there are still lacks of user friendly software in gas lift optimization. The ultimate goal of this study is to develop user friendly program using commercial Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software for optimization of continuous flow gas lift for single well. GAMBIT 2.3.16 was used for modelling the tubing string prior the simulation process. Two-phase CFD calculations using Eulerian–Eulerian model and commercial CFD package FLUENT 6.0 were employed to calculate the gas-liquid flow in the string. The depth and the rate of gas injection were the main parameter tested. The simulation results showed that the highest velocity of flowing fluid was observed when the gas was injected at the lowest point, which is at 5 m from the casing shoe in this study. The velocity of flowing fluid was increased by 1.7% when the gas injection rate increased 20%. This interrelationship was observed with regard of the decrease in liquid column density. CFD is capable in aiding faster continuous flow gas lift optimization process.