Permanent Magnet (PM) Induction Heater for Paraffin Abatement

There are an estimated 1.7 million oil and gas wells in the United States, 771,000 of these are considered marginal producers. Combined they make up 11.3% of the US oil production and 8.3% of the US gas production. In that last 10 years, over 131,000 of these oil wells and 48,000 gas wells have been plugged and abandoned. Most of these wells suffer from paraffin plugging problems. The only way to extend the economic life of these wells is to reduce operating costs and/or increase production. A new paraffin abatement tool was built and successfully tested in a simulated wellbore as a part of Phase 1 of this SBIR project. In Phase 2 a field deployable tool was built and tested in a commercial well. Several improvements were made to the tool design. In Phase 2B the supply chain for building a large number of tools will be established as well as a sales and support organization to deploy the tool all over the US. The tool provides a simple and novel way to prevent downhole paraffin buildup to both increase production and reduce operating costs. The tool which permanently screws into the tubing and the sucker rods generates heat over a specific depth interval in the tubing by converting the up and down motion of the sucker rods to the rotary motion of a metal tube within an array of magnets. We have demonstrated that for our tool the induction currents generated by this rotary motion generates over 2KW of heat per foot of tool length. This heating keeps the oil above the cloud point temperature until it reaches the surface. The full-scale tool that has been designed, built and field-tested has many commercial and technical advantages over current methods (hot-oiling or chemical treatment using paraffin inhibitors): (1) Higher continuous oil production. Much less decline in production because there is no buildup of paraffin in tubing over time; (2) 10-20% lower annual treating costs than hot oiling or paraffin inhibitor chemicals; (3) No formation damage to the well. No paraffin being squeezed into the perfs (as happens in hot oiling); (4) The heat is generated where it is needed (at the depth where paraffin is forming). The rest of the wellbore and rock is not heated.; (5) The tool integrates with existing tubing and sucker rod. No additional equipment, power requirements or operational changes are needed.; (6) The tool is modular, so its heating capacity can be adjusted to meet the needs of different wells.; and (7) Permanent tool installation results in less frequent well workovers and well intervention. The market and/or market segment we are targeting is well over $1 billion annually. With better performance, lower cost, higher efficiency and improved production, we expect the PM heater to be an attractive solution to virtually all oil and gas operators. The primary hurdle we will need to overcome in order to gain market/customer acceptance is the initial demonstration of the technology in several wells over a period of time. Most operators are eager to adopt the technology after it has been demonstrated to be effective and reliable in other oil wells. To demonstrate the capabilities of the tool and to install it in a reliable manner in the first few wells we have partnered with several operators and service providers (see Letters of Commitment). Once we have established the effectiveness of the tool through case studies and establish the sales and supply chain we plan to install several hundred tools in wells every year. With sales and technical representatives in the field we will be able to deploy the tool and support it across all markets in the US and Canada.