Name:

Company:

Phone Number:

Email:

Message:

 

Engineering & Testing

Home » Engineering & Testing

Research & Engineering Division
New Product Engineering
Inflow Control Device Engineering
Testing Services

Tejas Research & Engineering Division Back to Top

Tejas Research & Engineering, a division of Tejas Completion Solutions, is committed to being a leader in the oil and gas industry by setting the standard for quality, integrity, and industry service through our superior client dedication and exceptional new product development time cycle in our Technology Centers located in The Woodlands, Texas and Tulsa, Oklahoma.

New Product Engineering Back to Top

Getting new products to market quickly remains an essential, but costly aspect of the oil service industry. There is a better way. Tejas Research & Engineering gets new products to market quicker and more efficiently. Here is how we do it:

  • Mobilization
    Tejas' size is an advantage because we are still able to respond rapidly and aggressively to you, our client, without the bureaucracy and delaying internal processes of a larger company.
  • Project Focus
    At Tejas, we dedicate many of our resources to new product development. When one of our design teams has your development project, they focus on being the “tip of the spear”, without the corporate distractions found in many companies.
  • Intellectual Property
    Tejas has a reputation for safely navigating through difficult patent restrictions to bring client solutions to reality. Your confidentiality and applicable intellectual property protection are very important to us.
  • Partnering
    The success of new product development projects hinge on communication and collaboration. Our built-in review periods allow for open dialog on a project's direction, timeline, and outcome. Tejas project managers are available at any hour to answer questions, setup web-meetings, or provide field stewardship as needed.

Inflow Control Device Engineering Back to Top

Passive inflow control, or ICD, technology can offer double digit oil recovery improvements. The best results are obtained when the ICD completion is optimized properly using a comprehensive work process including a dynamic, coupled well and reservoir simulator such as ICDSIM. The reason is that a change in the ICD design has time dependent effects on the flow of oil, water and gas in the reservoir and well. The use of a steady state wellbore/reservoir simulation tool alone is therefore not sufficient. Tejas Research and Engineering has developed a work process that incorporates a suite of software tools especially designed to handle many of the engineering tasks combined with advanced completions such as ICD completions such as:

  • Evaluate economical benefits from ICDs
  • Establish ICD control envelope and customized ICD design for a specific implementation
  • Design ICDs with required flow characteristics
  • Investigate need for zone isolation
  • Predict optimal ICD settings during installation
  • Design well clean up procedures
  • Design safe ramp up procedures
  • Design wellbore treatment procedures (i.e. squeeze)

Thus, the real challenge in getting the most out of an ICD application is in understanding the interaction between the wellbore, each ICD and the reservoir. In its Tulsa, Oklahoma Technology Center, Tejas has a staff of accomplished MS and PhD level fluid flow and petroleum engineering specialists covering the reservoir and completion. Our staff is trained to properly optimize the ICD implementations.

However, the involvement of and good communication with the client is essential to obtain good results. Thus, the work process with ICD specific software tools will also made available for Tejas' customers together with necessary support and training. The below picture illustrates the engineering tasks and software tools involved in a typical ICD implementation.


Figure: Comprehensive ICD Engineering Process

ICDCALC - Software for Single Well Design

ICDCALC is Tejas' design and analysis software for single ICDs. ICDCALC can handle all commercially available ICD designs like orifices/nozzles, flow channels or labyrinths. In addition to designing ICDs to meet certain flow specifications, it can be used to compare various basic ICD types with respect to viscosity dependency etc. ICDCALC has the following main modules:

  • ICDCALC Prediction Model generates ICD performance curves and flow characteristics from specific ICD design parameters and then uses the ICD flow characteristics to calculate ICD performance curves.
  • ICDCALC Inverse Model uses ICD performance data from lab tests , CFD modeling or ICDSIM to generate ICD flow characteristics for use in the design process and for tuning parameters in the physical ICD models

ICDCALC is linked with ICDSIM, our coupled wellbore and reservoir simulator described further below.

ICDSIM - Software for Analysis of Wells with ICD Completions

We regard the process of properly simulating the wellbore and reservoir interaction as a natural part of our ICD product. As the interaction between the reservoir and the advanced completion varies with time, a proper evaluation of these completions requires dynamic simulations. Thus, dynamic simulations are necessary to establish the economical potential from using ICDs. ICDSIM is a fully coupled, transient simulator for integrated simulations of advanced completions and reservoirs. This technology has the unique ability to handle the most advanced completions and well paths. The simulator has an exceptionally flexible multiphase network model for the wellbore. This model can incorporate any flow geometry, including multiple laterals, multiple annuli and any combination of screens and ICD's.


Figure: Typical flow network used to simulate flow through an advanced completion.

ICDSIM can be used to forecast production with or without the use of ICDs. The figures below show ICDSIM simulations of a well in heterogeneous formation with and without ICDs. Note how the early local water coning in high permeability layers is delayed by the use of ICDs.

ICDSIM is also used to predict premature gas coning due to heel/to effect from frictional pressure losses and how ICDs can be used to prevent this phenomenon. This is illustrated in the below figures.

ICDSIM can be used to study the required range of inflow control for a field to establish the optimal custom ICD hardware design.

ICDSIM can also be used to predict the most favorable ICD settings along the wellbore. The objective is to optimize the adjustment of inflow control along the wellbore before the completion is installed. This is especially useful as Ziebel's ICDs are easily adjustable on the rig before installation.

We are also able to use ICDSIM without the reservoir simulation part for quick look analysis. This type of use is equivalent to using the commonly known NetTool steady state wellbore modeling software.

Testing Services Back to Top

Tejas recently announced the opening of its new high-pressure, high-temperature testing facility on the Woodlands Campus. Our above ground bunker is capable of testing your equipment to hydrostatic or gas pressures up to 60,000 psi and temperatures ranging from a low temperature of -250F up to +1000°F. We also offer sinusoidal, shock, and random vibration testing to 30g in-situ with applied pressure and temperature.

Our test cells have been designed around modular control manifolds that allow us to rapidly re-configure tests with little to no down-time. We also provide ancillary services such as turn-key test engineering, strain gauging, procedure writing, fixture design / manufacturing, and secure web-based project monitoring.

Our employees are never exposed to high pressure manifolds or valves. All of the testing equipment is digitally controlled with pneumatic actuators from a control room within the facility. Remotely controlled digital cameras provide constant visual and audio monitoring as well as recording inside the bunkers during all testing operations.

Tejas provides a wide variety of testing services for oilfield equipment validation needs.

We currently have the following capabilities:

  • High Pressure / High Temperature Testing (60,000 psi and 1000° F)
  • Finite Element Analysis (FEA) Test Correlation
  • Test Fixture Design and Engineering Services
  • Strain Gauge Testing
  • Combined Load Testing
  • Vibration Testing (up to 60 Gs)
  • Chemical Testing (Vacuum at Temperature)