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Vessel Internal Electrostatic Coalescer (VIEC) : Innovative Engineering
Vessel Internal Electrostatic Coalescer (VIEC) : Innovative Engineering
Vessel Internal
Electrostatic
Coalescer (VIEC)
Novel oil-water separation technology
Wojciech Piasecki, Marek Florkowski, Marek Fulczyk, Jakub Sipowicz,
Hans Kristian Sundt
In offshore oil production, the well output is a platform. In many cases, to achieve a separator
mixture of oil, gas and water. Gas is released as output with 5–10 % water is time consuming and
pressure decreases along process stages but requires an injection of chemical demulsifiers.
water-oil separation, especially in high viscosity
crude oils is much more difficult. ABB has significantly improved this process by
successfully employing what is known as the
Water droplets are dispersed forming water-oil electrocoalescence technique to the first stage
emulsions which can be extremely stable due to of the separation process. This has led to the
surface-active molecules and particles attaching development of a modular device known as a
themselves to the water-oil interface. Vessel Internal Electrostatic Coalescer (VIEC).
The VIEC has reduced the troublesome emulsion
Typically, a multi-stage separation process is layer in the first stage separator and has also
employed and the first stage separation vessel reduced the required injection of demulsifier from
is one of the largest pieces of equipment on the 10 to 2 ppmv.
ABB Review
4/2004 67
Innovative Engineering
68 ABB Review
4/2004
Innovative Engineering
From an electrical point of view, the use voltage using the Pulse Width Modula-
Troll C platform: First stage
of insulating plates forms a connection tion (PWM) principle. The Digital Signal 2
separator with VIEC installed.
similar to that of two capacitors in Processor (DSP)-based generator per-
series: one capacitor is formed by the mits on-line adjustments of frequency
insulation layer on the plates whereas and amplitude so that the optimal oper-
the second one is represented by the ating point can be maintained. This
emulsion between the plate surfaces. technology has made it possible for in-
The emulsion is characterized by a high dividual modules to consume no more
dielectric loss factor making the con- than 50 W, thus making the total typical
struction of an insulated coalescer oper- power consumption of an installation
ating at 50/60 Hz difficult. The reason consisting of 40 modules smaller than
being that the low impedance of the 2 kW. Compared with traditional elec-
emulsion results in a high voltage drop trocoalescers using heavy 50/60Hz
across the insulation layer. power transformers, the VIEC power
supply is quite a miniature device.
To overcome this, the VIEC uses a dedi- A pilot installation of ABB’s VIEC on the
cated frequency converter to shift the VIEC installation on the TROLL C TROLL C platform [4] was commissioned
operating frequency into the kHz region. platform in June 2003. The installation, 2 , con-
The combination of high frequency and The Troll C platform (see title picture) sists of 36 modules (located in the first
thick insulation helps the VIEC to better was commissioned by Norsk Hydro in stage separator) connected to the driving
tolerate, and in fact make use of the 1999 to exploit the thin oil layers below unit which houses 36 frequency convert-
harsh first stage separator conditions. the Troll field gas cap. The Troll field is ers. The complete system is divided into
currently the largest oil producer on the two sections, each of which is powered
The VIEC module resembles epoxy Norwegian continental shelf. The Troll C from a separate DC power supply.
encapsulated medium voltage apparatus platform itself produces 220,000 barrels
produced by ABB, such as voltage and of oil per day. Since turning it on, the average oil qual-
current transformers. It is comprised ity from the first stage separator in late
of electrodes that are powered by trans- The separation process in the first stage 2003 was shown to be three times bet-
formers which are moulded into a per- separator on Troll C, however, suffered ter: water content was reduced to be-
forated epoxy wall inside the separator. from reduced capacity and poor water tween 3 and 5 %. Operating conditions
Teflon tubes are used in the mould to level monitoring. Consequently, the wa- have significantly improved and this is
create holes for the turbulent fluid flow. ter content in the oil at the separator clearly illustrated by a reduction in the
The turbulence increases the collision outlet exceeded 10 %. A solution was emulsion layer as shown by the separa-
rate of water droplets, and thus increas- therefore urgently required. tor density profile in 3 . With the VIEC
es performance. The tubes also work
as miniature separators allowing the
droplets to settle into a liquid film.
3 Density profiler screen showing the improvement in phase separation.
The time the fluid spends inside the
VIEC element depends largely on the oil
properties and on the physical layout
Vertical position (m)
ABB Review
4/2004 69
Innovative Engineering
off, the profile shown indicates a very either: reduce water content in oil; re- ration, in one step, to below 2 %! This
gradual vertical density change. This duce demulsifier injection; or increase would help eliminate hydrate problems
means that most of the process fluid in capacity to equal quality. One or all of in subsea oil pipelines. As the water-oil
the separator is still the emulsion, while these effects may dominate depending separation problem is not restricted to
thin oil and water layers occupy the top on the oil and other aspects of the sepa- the off-shore oil production, VIEC in
and bottom areas respectively. ration process. A comparison between on-shore process facilities is also being
the traditional and the new separation considered.
After the VIEC is turned on, clearly technology using VIEC is shown in 4 .
defined interfaces become visible. The
top section of the vessel contains the Conclusions
oil phase and water is present at the The successful pilot installation of ABB’s
bottom. The emulsion layer lies be- pioneering VIEC system on the Troll C
tween the oil and water phases. The platform is the first worldwide applica-
thickness of the inner layer is well tion of active coalescence in first stage
Wojciech Piasecki
defined making the control of the inter- separators. This fact was recognized at
Marek Florkowski
face level and thus the oil/water resi- the Offshore Technology Conference in
Marek Fulczyk
dence time accurate. The emulsion Houston (OTC 2004), where VIEC
Jakub Sipowicz
layer is reduced to a third of the height received the prestigious technology
ABB Corporate Research
when VIEC is turned on. In fact, since award.
Krakow, Poland
installing the VIEC, the demulsifier
wojciech.piasecki@pl.abb.com
injection level has been reduced from VIEC is a door-opener for other tech-
10 ppmv to 1.5 ppmv and further trial nologies requiring multi-channel electri-
Hans Kristian Sundt
reductions are planned. cal functionality inside process vessels.
ABB Offshore Systems
Billingstad, Norway
The tests have shown that improved Further development of this new tech-
hans-kristian.sundt@no.abb.com
separation using VIEC can be used to nology may soon result in subsea sepa-
References
[1] Sande, G., Piasecki, W., Nilsen, P.J., ‘A coalescing device’, patent NO-316109, 2001.
[2] Harris, F.W., ‘Dehydrator for petroleum emulsions and water controlled system for same’, US patent 1 405 124, 1922.
[3] Aske, N., Kallevik, H and Sjöblom, J., ‘Water-in-crude oil emulsion stability studied by critical electric field measurements. Correlation to physico-
chemical parameters and near-infrared spectroscopy’, Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering, 2002, 36.
[4] Wolff E., Knutsen T. L., Piasecki, W., Hansson, P., and Nilsen P.J., ‘Advanced electrostatic internals in the 1st stage separator enhance oil/water
separation and reduce chemical consumption on the Troll C platform Offshore Technoloy Conference’, Houston 2004.
70 ABB Review
4/2004