Eventos Anais de eventos
COBEM 2023
27th International Congress of Mechanical Engineering
Experimental investigation into the impact of stage number on the performance of ESP operating with a gas-liquid mixture.
Submission Author:
Yan Capellaro , SP
Co-Authors:
Yan Capellaro, William Monte Verde, Rafael Franklin Lazaro de Cerqueira, Julio Picinato Orssatto, Bernardo Foresti, Antonio Bannwart, Marcelo Souza de Castro
Presenter: Rafael Franklin Lazaro de Cerqueira
doi://10.26678/ABCM.COBEM2023.COB2023-0581
Abstract
Electric submersible pumps (ESPs) are one of the most widely used artificial lift methods. However, their performance is greatly affected by the presence of gas in the working fluid. In oil production, the operating conditions are fundamental for an economically viable well, so understanding phenomena such as surging and gas locking is an important piece of the puzzle in solving the problems when a compressible phase is present in the working fluid. Several studies present the operating parameters, such as rotor geometry, viscosity, etc., in an isolated manner. In this study, the authors aim to investigate the effects of different numbers of stages on ESP performance degradation and the ability of a convolutional neural network to predict flow patterns based on images of the inside of an impeller. A prototype based on a modified ESP P23 has been built in order to change the number of stages in a modular way, being able to accommodate four different configurations, with 1, 2, 3 and 4 stages. The modified pump also has two visualization windows, allowing to visualize the inside of one of the stages, which is the last in the assembled system, and the inlet of the first stage. Using two high-speed cameras, one for each visualization section, and measuring the pump pressure stage by stage, the tests were carried out with a wide range of gas flow rates, liquid flow rates, four different stage configurations and three different ESP speeds. The test matrix has been completed and the large amount of data is being analyzed. Initial results show that the performance of the pump under gas-liquid flow deteriorates the fewer stages the ESP is equipped with. This is particularly the case at lower speeds. Surging and gas blocking effects also occur earlier and more severely with fewer stages.
Keywords
Electric Submersible Pump, Two-phase Flow, Gas-Liquid Flow, Flow Visualization
