Any latest development in the world of asphaltene inhibitor and asphaltene in general?
Win Robbins
Advanced Characterization - petroleum at Carmagen Engineering
Asphaltenes are not a compound or a class of compounds, they are an event cuased by solvent incompatibility. A solvent strength change can occur by pressure drop in the production tubing in the upstream or by blending with oils with different composition, i.e. both upstream and downstream. Asphaltene aggregation and precipitation causes problems in areas as diverse as emulsions in oil water separators/desalters, deposits & fouling in heat exchangers, poisoning& plugging hydroprocessing catalysts, and even creating hotspots in cokers. The "composition" and occurrence of asphaltenes has been studied extensively both academically and by the refining industry. Over my 30+ years working for Exxon, I followed processes have proposed for asphaltene and metals removal, including some of my own. In the past decade, more characterization has been achieved, but the problems remain.
Search the literature for papers by Mullins (Schlumberger) for discussions of size and pressure drop, Kilpatrick (Notre Dame) Rodgers (FSU-NationalHigh Field Magnet Lab) for compostion, Chapman (Rice) and Folger (U MIchigan) on phase behavior, Buckley(New Mexco Tech) and Jeff Creek (Chervon) on flow assurance, and Wiehe (Soluble Solutions) for discussion of solvent compatibility. All these individuals have been working closely with chemical service vendors in addressing asphaltene deposition. As Manfred has indicated, success is limited to specific cases because the "asphaltene event" can be induced by so many variables that there is no universal solution.
Manfred Eigner
Owner, ME Consultancy Services (MECS) and Oil & Energy Consultant
Thanks Win for your fine comments. They are 100% in line with my way of thinking about asphaltene deposition problems during oil production. There is no ideal solution and one has to look into each deposition problem separately. It may be possible to arrive at a solution for that particular case but the next problem may not fit. I hope you can agree to the new approach that people started to look into the phase behavior of native crude oil w.r.t. asphaltene solubility. By managing the phase behavior one may arrive at a more practical solution: how can we produce a life crude oil without initiating asphaltene precipitation or even deposition. Please note: I am using here two different physical phenomena on purpose: precipitation followed by deposition. Back in the eighties we were able to manage deposition thereby allowing precipitation (experience from wells in Kuwait). Mike was so kind to invite me to Oilfieldwiki to add some more practical information. I promised to do that, so watch the special page.
Win Robbins
Advanced Characterization - petroleum at Carmagen Engineering
Manfred,
A large number of excellent papers have been presented at the Petrophase conferences where many of the people I cited meet annually to discuss asphaltenes and other phase related problems. Meetings are annual; Petrophase 2014 will be in Galveston.
Growing agreement among attendees is that aggregation and adsorption are separate phenomena.
Ahmed Helmi
Adjunct Professor at Pharos University
Gents: Enjoyed very much the thoughts/insight in your discussion. I noticed mentioning the names of a few of the Biggies, EXXON & Shell, that some of you had been working in and faced/involved in the Asphaltenes' deposition problems. A thought came to my mind as I got to the last comment: If the Biggies have not yet met to set a joint R&D plan to find a universal solution to the Aspheltenes Deposition problems, why the prestigeous API has not done a Research Plan so far? I see the finding of a Universal Solution as lacking Management much more Technical capabilities. My students here in Egypt are used hearing me saying now and then a phrase: The Americans are the Pharoes of Petroleum Engineering as the Russians are the Masters of Petroleum Geochemistry. I am quite sure that America has more than needed of Technical capabilities to accomplish a Universal Solution for the Asphaltenes Deposition problems, just let someone/someauthority like the API take the role of Managing the needed Research. What do you think?
