Gas lift allocation optimization using Pipesim network optimizer

Abstract

This work maximizes oil production from a network of gas lift wells and determines the optimal amount of lift gas with PIPESIM network optimizer. PIPESIM was used to build a couple wellbore-flowline model and its network optimizer was utilized to maximize oil production from a network of gas lifted wells. Two wells were created (Well A and B) and connected to their respective flow lines to a manifold and from the manifold to the central processing facility (CPF) represented by a sink node. A comparison of the oil production rate from Well B with and without constraint on water production rate shows that 7337.432STB/day of oil was produced without any constraints on water production while 7373.479 STB/day of oil was produced with constraint on water production and Well A, 280.6693 STB/day of oil was produced without any constraints on water production while 3.266503 STB/day of oil was produced with constraint on water production. For the injection of 4MMscf/day of gas with a constraint of 1800STB/day on water production, results reveals that a total gas lift rate of 3.723612MMscf/day was required to lift a total oil rate of 7484.669STB/day. Therefore, out of the 4MMscf/day of gas available, 3.723612MMscf/day should be allocated to the network to optimized production.