Volume 52

Study on heat transfer characteristics of high water cut crude oil in FRP pipeline Yuanzhi Qin, Hanwen Zhang, Le Yu, Jingru Tian, Zhen Wei, Shishi Fei, Xingwen Zhong, Wenchen Liu, Xingyue Pu, Qiyu Huang

Abstract

When the high water cut crude oil is collected and transported at low temperature, a large amount of adhesive oil in the traditional stainless steel (SS) pipeline leads to the increase of wellhead back pressure, which seriously threatens the production safety of the oilfield. In this study, the heat transfer characteristics of fiberglass reinforced plastic (FRP) and SS pipe sections were tested with indoor loop experimental equipment, and the temperature drop and pressure drop of oil-water suspension in FRP pipe and SS pipe were studied. Simultaneously, the entire process involving convective heat transfer and heat conduction in FRP and SS pipes is characterized through heat transfer calculations. The experimental and calculation results show that the pressure drop in the SS pipe section is much greater than that in the FRP pipe section at the same temperature drop time, and the FRP pipe is more conducive to safe transportation. In addition, compared with the SS tube section, the temperature of the oil-water suspension in the FRP tube section takes longer to drop from 40 °C to 30 °C. FRP pipeline has better insulation performance, which is more conducive to the implementation of low temperature gathering and transportation (LTGT) technology of high water cut crude oil.

Keywords FRP pipeline, high water cut crude oil, heat transfer characteristics, loop experiment, low temperature gathering and transportation