A review of in situ upgrading technology for heavy crude oil

Li, Yibo; Wang, Zhiqiang; Hu, Zhiming; Xu, Bin; Li, Yalong; Pu, Wanfen; Zhao, Jinzhou

doi:10.1016/j.petlm.2020.09.004

Cited by 87 publications

(35 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…Compared to other processes, it exhibits lower technological complexity [15,41], and a lower minimum jet biofuel selling price [43], with higher energy efficiency [44]. Hydrotreatment processes of petroleum streams is already a well-established technology for the removal of sulfur (hydrodesulfurization), nitrogen (hydrodenitrogenation) and oxygen (hydrodeoxygenation), as well as for the saturation of olefins and aromatics [45,46]. Therefore, the hydroprocessing of esters and fatty acids for jet biofuel production may be performed at existing refineries, thereby reducing capital costs.…”

Section: Catalytic Hydroprocessing Of Esters and Fatty Acids (Hefa)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Production of Jet Biofuels by Catalytic Hydroprocessing of Esters and Fatty Acids: A Review

et al. 2022

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The transition from fossil to bio-based fuels is a requisite for reducing CO2 emissions in the aviation sector. Jet biofuels are alternative aviation fuels with similar chemical composition and performance of fossil jet fuels. In this context, the Hydroprocessing of Esters and Fatty Acids (HEFA) presents the most consolidated pathway for producing jet biofuels. The process for converting esters and/or fatty acids into hydrocarbons may involve hydrodeoxygenation, hydrocracking and hydroisomerization, depending on the chemical composition of the selected feedstock and the desired fuel properties. Furthermore, the HEFA process is usually performed under high H2 pressures and temperatures, with reactions mediated by a heterogeneous catalyst. In this framework, supported noble metals have been preferably employed in the HEFA process; however, some efforts were reported to utilize non-noble metals, achieving a similar performance of noble metals. Besides the metallic site, the acidic site of the catalyst is crucial for product selectivity. Bifunctional catalysts have been employed for the complete process of jet biofuel production with standardized properties, with a special remark for using zeolites as support. The proper design of heterogeneous catalysts may also reduce the consumption of hydrogen. Finally, the potential of enzymes as catalysts for intermediate products of the HEFA pathway is highlighted.

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Section: Catalytic Hydroprocessing Of Esters and Fatty Acids (Hefa)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Production of Jet Biofuels by Catalytic Hydroprocessing of Esters and Fatty Acids: A Review

et al. 2022

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“…Also, plastics and other medical equipment must continuously be made especially in this age where virus is rapidly being transmitted throughout the world. Heavy oils and bitumen are very sticky and most of them do not flow under natural reservoir conditions due to their very high viscosity of up to 1.2 × 10 2 cP and API gravity of even lower than 8° API depending on the reservoir (Attanasi and Meyer 2010;Hein 2017;Li et al 2020;Meyer et al 2007;Zhang et al 2019). Thus, the urgent need for technologies for energy-efficient and environmentally friendly upgrading and production of heavy oils and bitumen cannot be overstated.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Use of two vertical injectors in place of a horizontal injector to improve the efficiency and stability of THAI in situ combustion process for producing heavy oils

Ado

2021

J Petrol Explor Prod Technol

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The current commercial technologies used to produce heavy oils and bitumen are carbon-, energy-, and wastewater-intensive. These make them to be out of line with the global efforts of decarbonisation. Alternative processes such as the toe-to-heel air injection (THAI) that works as an in situ combustion process that uses horizontal producer well to recover partially upgraded oil from heavy oils and bitumen reservoirs are needed. However, THAI is yet to be technically and economically well proven despite pilot and semi-commercial operations. Some studies concluded using field data that THAI is a low-oil-production-rate process. However, no study has thoroughly investigated the simultaneous effects of start-up methods and wells configuration on both the short and long terms stability, sustainability, and profitability of the process. Using THAI validated model, three models having a horizontal producer well arranged in staggered line drive with the injector wells are simulated using CMG STARS. Model A has two vertical injectors via which steam was used for pre-ignition heating, and models B and C each has a horizontal injector via which electrical heater and steam were respectively used for pre-ignition heating. It is found that during start-up, ultimately, steam injection instead of electrical heating should be used for the pre-ignition heating. Clearly, it is shown that model A has higher oil production rates after the increase in air flux and also has a higher cumulative oil recovery of 2350 cm3 which is greater than those of models B and C by 9.6% and 4.3% respectively. Thus, it can be concluded that for long-term projects, model A settings and wells configuration should be used. Although it is now discovered that the peak temperature cannot in all settings tell how healthy a combustion front is, it has revealed that model A does indeed have far more stable, safer, and efficient combustion front burning quality and propagation due to the maintenance of very high peak temperatures of mostly greater than 600 °C and very low concentrations of produced oxygen of lower than 0.4 mol% compared to up to 2.75 mol% in model C and 1 mol% in model B. Conclusively, since drilling of, and achieving uniform air distribution in horizontal injector (HI) well in actual field reservoir are costly and impracticable at the moment, and that electrical heating will require unphysically long time before mobilised fluids reach the HP well as heat transfer is mainly by conduction, these findings have shown decisively that the easy-and-cheaper-to-drill two vertical injector wells configured in a staggered line drive pattern with the horizontal producer should be used, and steam is thus to be used for pre-ignition heating.

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“…Heavy oils and bitumen contain high fraction of asphaltic molecules which comprise preasphaltene, asphaltenes, and resins. As a result, under native reservoir conditions, heavy oils and bitumen are dense with American Petroleum Institute (API) gravity of lower than 20° and they are very sticky with very large viscosities ranging from hundreds to millions of centipoise (cP) (Hein, 2017 ; Li et al, 2020 ; Zhang et al, 2019 ). Whilst heavy oils have some partial mobility, bitumen is virtually immobile at the typical reservoirs temperatures and pressures.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…nitrogen, carbon dioxide, light hydrocarbons, polymers, surfactants, alkaline, etc.) injection, electrical resistive or inductive heating, in situ catalytic upgrading process, etc., are used to produce oil from the heavy oils, tar sand and bitumen reservoirs (Guo et al, 2016 ; Li et al, 2020 ; Mokrys and Butler, 1993 ; Shah et al, 2010 ; Yuan et al, 2019 ). Among the different techniques, thermal processes for heavy oils and bitumen upgrading and recovery have been shown to exhibit higher recovery factors both at laboratory and during field trials, and even at commercial scale (Guo et al, 2016 ; Shah et al, 2010 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Detailed investigations of the influence of catalyst packing porosity on the performance of THAI-CAPRI process for in situ catalytic upgrading of heavy oil and bitumen

Ado

2021

J Petrol Explor Prod Technol

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Heavy oils and bitumen are indispensable resources for a turbulent-free transition to a decarbonized global energy and economic system. This is because according to the analysis of the International Energy Agency’s 2020 estimates, the world requires up to 770 billion barrels of oil from now to year 2040. However, BP’s 2020 statistical review of world energy has shown that the global total reserves of the cheap-to-produce conventional oil are roughly only 520.2 billion barrels. This implies that the huge reserves of the practically unexploited difficult-and-costly-to-upgrade-and-produce heavy oils and bitumen must be immediately developed using advanced upgrading and extraction technologies which have greener credentials. Furthermore, in accordance with climate change mitigation strategies and to efficiently develop the heavy oils and bitumen resources, producers would like to maximize their upgrading within the reservoirs by using energy-efficient and environmentally friendly technologies such as the yet-to-be-fully-understood THAI-CAPRI process. The THAI-CAPRI process uses in situ combustion and in situ catalytic reactions to produce high-quality oil from heavy oils and bitumen reservoirs. However, prolonging catalyst life and effectiveness and maximizing catalytic reactions are a major challenge in the THAI-CAPRI process. Therefore, in this work, the first ever-detailed investigations of the effects of alumina-supported cobalt oxide–molybdenum oxide (CoMo/γ-Al2O3) catalyst packing porosity on the performance of the THAI-CAPRI process are performed through numerical simulations using CMG STARS. The key findings in this study include: the larger the catalyst packing porosity, the higher the accessible surface area for the mobilized oil to reach the inner coke-uncoated catalysts and thus the higher the API gravity and quality of the produced oil, which clearly indicated that sulphur and nitrogen heteroatoms were catalytically removed and replaced with hydrogen. Over the 290 min of combustion period, slightly more oil (i.e. an additional 0.43% oil originally in place (OOIP)) is recovered in the model which has the higher catalyst packing porosity. In other words, there is a cumulative oil production of 2330 cm3 when the catalyst packing porosity is 56% versus a cumulative oil production of 2300 cm3 in the model whose catalyst packing porosity is 45%. The larger the catalyst packing porosity, the lower the mass and thus cost of the catalyst required per m3 of annular space around the horizontal producer well. The peak temperature and the very small amount of produced oxygen are only marginally affected by the catalyst packing porosity, thereby implying that the extents of the combustion and thermal cracking reactions are respectively the same in both models. Thus, the higher upgrading achieved in the model whose catalyst packing porosity is 56% is purely due to the fact that the extent of the catalytic reactions in the model is larger than those in the model whose catalyst packing porosity is 45%.

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A review of in situ upgrading technology for heavy crude oil

Cited by 87 publications

References 32 publications

Production of Jet Biofuels by Catalytic Hydroprocessing of Esters and Fatty Acids: A Review

Production of Jet Biofuels by Catalytic Hydroprocessing of Esters and Fatty Acids: A Review

Use of two vertical injectors in place of a horizontal injector to improve the efficiency and stability of THAI in situ combustion process for producing heavy oils

Detailed investigations of the influence of catalyst packing porosity on the performance of THAI-CAPRI process for in situ catalytic upgrading of heavy oil and bitumen

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