Prediction of Temperature and Viscosity Profiles in Heavy-Oil Producer Wells Implementing a Downhole Induction Heater

Very high viscosity significantly impacts the mobility of heavy crude oil representing difficulties in production and a decrease in the well's efficiency. Downhole electric heating delivers a uniform injection of heat to the fluid and reservoir, resulting in a substantial decrease in dynamic viscosity due to its exponential relationship with temperature and a drop in frictional losses between the production zone and the pump intake. Therefore, this study predicts temperature and viscosity profiles in heavy oil-production wells implementing a downhole induction heater employing a simplified CFD model. For the development of the research, the geometry model was generated in CAD software based on the geometry provided by the BCPGroup and simulated in specialized CFD software. The model confirmed a 46.1% effective decrease of mean 12 degrees API heavy-oil dynamic viscosity compared with simulation results without heating. The developed model was validated with experimental data provided by the BCPGroup, obtaining an excellent agreement with 0.8% and 15.69% mean error percentages for temperature and viscosity, respectively. Furthermore, CFD results confirmed that downhole electrical induction heating is an effective method for reducing heavy-oil dynamic viscosity; however, thermal effects in the reservoir due to heat penetration were insignificant. For this study, the well will remain stimulated.

Automated summary

Downhole electric heating can effectively reduce the viscosity of heavy crude oil, improving the production efficiency of the well. This study predicts the temperature and viscosity profiles in heavy oil-production wells using a simplified CFD model. The results show that downhole electrical induction heating is effective in reducing heavy-oil dynamic viscosity, but has insignificant thermal effects in the reservoir.