Modeling of Asphaltene Precipitation in a Light Oil Reservoir with High Producing GOR: Case Study

Asphaltene precipitation is an important phenomenon faced during oil production that causes many problems such as plugging the reservoirs, production wells, and transmissionpipelines. Therefore, it is necessary to predict the asphaltene precipitated as a function of temperature and pressure. The aim of this study is to investigatethe effect of pressure and temperature on the asphaltene precipitation in an Iranian oil reservoir. For this reservoir, the heaviest component is spilitted and regrouped with a Commercial PVT Modelling Software. The new heaviest component is divided into precipitating and non-precipitating components. An equation of state (EOS) is tuned byusing experimental data including constant composition expansion (CCE), differential liberation (DL) and separator tests. The results of the stability analysis show that there is a high risk of asphaltene precipitation in this reservoir. The maximum amount of asphaltene precipitation occurs around the saturation pressure. It is also observed thatasphaltene precipitation is increased by decreasing the temperature along the production wells andtransmission pipe-lines.

Keywords:

Modeling , High GOR , Asphaltene Precipitation , Oil Reservoirs , Reservoir Management