CFD numerical simulation of standalone sand screen erosion due to gas-sand flow

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jngse.2020.103706Get rights and content

Highlights

  • The Discrete Phase Model (DPM) and the realizable K-epsilon model were employed to perform CFD-based erosion modelling.

  • Four erosion equations were applied to simulate and predict the erosion of standalone screen caused by sand particles.

  • Variations of screen pressure, outlet velocity, and erosion rates were analyzed with respect to change in particle properties.

  • The CFD simulation results were validated with another published empirical model, and a good agreement was achieved.

Abstract

Solid particles entrained in produced gas cause erosive damage in production and transportation facilities, that may eventually impact any process safety. The main purpose of this research is to determine the point on the Standalone screen (SAS) surface, where erosion rate is critical and to evaluate the uncertainties in the calculations and predictions of sand screen erosion utilizing CFD numerical simulation. A k-epsilon model was implemented to solve gas flow behavior and Discrete Phase Model (DPM) was used to track solid particles. The results of DPM were then introduced to conduct erosion simulation on the SAS utilizing four erosion equations. A full presentation of particle velocity vectors, particle velocity streamlines, total pressure contours and wall shear stress contours on the screen surface are presented and discussed. Additionally, the particle traces and path-lines are also demonstrated based on particles residence time as part of the particles’ trajectories. The erosion rates and erosion patterns from the four erosion equations, have shown similarities in their response to the change of sand characteristics. Considering the change in solid particles properties, a good agreement between CFD predictions and published data is achieved. This research can be used as a basis to offer safe operating guidelines for wells that are completed using standalone sand screens (SAS).

Section snippets

Credit author contribution statement

Ahmed Alghurabi: Conceptualization, Investigation, Software, Validation, Writing - original draft. Mysara Mohyaldinn: Supervision, Investigation, Validation. Shiferaw Jufar: Formal analysis. Obai Younis: Software. Abdullah Abduljabbar: Validation, Writing - review & editing. Mohd Azuwan: Data Curation.

Physical geometry model

The geometry is a perforated plate that was designed using “Auto-CAD” design modeler (2017 version) to represent a real sand screen with similar specifications, Fig. 3(a) and Fig. 3(b) show the 3-D view and front view of the geometry, respectively. The structured geometry was then imported into ANSYS Fluent 2019 (R3) design modeler to create an enclosure, as shown in Fig. 3(c), so that the boundary conditions of the flow are defined in order to represent a basic fluid flow simulation through a

Velocity vectors and streamlines

In oil and gas industry, the equipment material and dimensions are carefully chosen so that the flow velocity is below the so called “erosional velocity”. Erosional velocity is defined as the velocity under which there is no presence of erosion (Arabnejad Khanouki et al., 2014). It can be seen in Fig. 6(a) that high velocity intensity is concentrated around the edges of the screen making it obvious to analyze the erosion rate and location. The sizes of the small particles are assumed to be

Conclusion

In this study, a CFD simulation has been conducted to evaluate the erosion on standalone screen (SAS). The discrete phase model (DPM) was employed to track discrete sand particles in a continuous gas flow. The sand tracking parameters were then introduced to four erosion equations, viz. Fluent generic, McLaury, Finnie and Oka.

Three erosion equations have shown fair agreement in their erosion patterns. Finnie equation, however, has shown totally different erosion patterns due to the limitation

Funding

This research was funded by Yayasan Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS, grant number: 0153AA-H07.

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to extend their utmost gratitude to the Yayasan Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS (YUTP FRG Grant No: 0153AA-H07) at Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS for providing the financial support.

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