What is thermal heavy oil?

What is thermal heavy oil?

Variperm is positioned as a sand control leader in Thermal Heavy Oil, being a major provider to Steam Assisted Gravity Drainage (SAGD) and Cyclic Steam Stimulation (CSS) projects in the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin. Most thermal projects require some form of sand control.

What is heavy oil?

What is Heavy Oil and How is it Formed? As defined by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), heavy oil is a type of crude oil characterized by an asphaltic, dense, viscous nature (similar to molasses), and its asphaltene (very large molecules incorporating roughly 90 percent of the sulfur and metals in the oil) content.

What is heavy oil used for?

While light oils primarily used to create fuels such as gasoline, diesel and aviation fuels, heavy crudes (which also yield these transportation fuels) also provide feedstock for plastics, petrochemicals, other fuels and road surfacing.

What is heavy oil fuel type?

Heavy Fuel Oil (HFO) is a category of fuel oils of a tar-like consistency. Also known as bunker fuel, or residual fuel oil, HFO is the result or remnant from the distillation and cracking process of petroleum.

How is heavy oil obtained?

Conventional oil is extracted from underground reservoirs using traditional drilling and pumping methods. Conventional oil is a liquid at atmospheric temperature and pressure, so it can flow through a wellbore and a pipeline – unlike bitumen (oil sands oil) which is too thick to flow without being heated or diluted.

Where is heavy oil produced?

Most heavy oil is found at the margins of geologic basins and is thought to be the residue of formerly light oil that has lost its light-molecular-weight components through degradation by bacteria, water-washing, and evaporation.

What is an example of a heavy oil?

Heavy oil may refer to: Coal tar creosote, a wood preservative and waterproofing agent. Diesel fuel. Fuel oil that contains residual oil left over from petroleum distillation.

What are the characteristics of heavy oil?

The fundamental characteristics of heavy crude oils are high viscosity and density, chemical complexity, high acidity, high sulfur, increased level of metal and heteroatom impurities, high asphaltenes content, low American Petroleum Institute (API) gravity, and low H/C ratio [3].

What is heavy oil and tar sands?

Heavy oil is defined as liquid petroleum of less than 20°API gravity or more than 200 cp viscosity at reservoir conditions. No explicit differentiation is made between heavy oil and oil sands (tar sands), although the criteria of less than 12°API gravity and greater than 10,000 cp are sometimes used to define oil sands.

What is being developed for the production of heavy oil?

Specialized techniques are being developed for exploration and production of heavy oil. Production of heavy oil is becoming more common in many countries, with 2008 production led by Canada and Venezuela.

What is heavy crude oil and how is it classified?

Heavy crude oil is generally categorized in two ways: Those that have over 1% sulfur (high sulfur crude oils), with aromatics and asphaltenes. Those that have less than 1% sulfur (low sulfur crude oils), with aromatics, naphthenes and resins, and these are mostly found in Western Africa (Chad), Central Africa (Angola) and East Africa (Madagascar).

What is the difference between conventional heavy oil and bitumen?

Conventional heavy oil and bitumens differ in the degree by which they have been degraded from the original crude oil by bacteria and erosion. ( Meyer, 2003 & 1) Often, bitumen is more viscous than cold molasses and does not flow at ambient conditions.