Tatneft employs steam-assisted gravity drive for high-viscosity oil recovery

"According to the current plans production rate of heavy oil in Russia will make about 200 million tons before 2015", – such figures were provided by the chief geologist of Tatneft Rais Hisamov in his speech on June 19^th at the seminar, organized by the National Center for Technology Innovation (NCTI).

According to Hisamov there are 450  reservoirs of such oil in Tatarstanat at present. To facilitate its recovery the companies started to implement the steam-assisted gravity drive technology. The main principle of this technology refers to creation of a "steam chamber", used for reduction of oil viscosity.  Additional injection of reagents also stimulates viscosity reduction at a lower temperature. "Currently there are 3 wells, where this technology is applied, and the 4^th  is being prepared for that, - noticed Hisamov. - In future we plan to cover about 6000 wells". For recovery of 1 ton of oil 3,5 – 4 tons of steam have to be injected. According to economic calculations, made by the company, this method is economically rational, if the price of oil is 70 USD per barrel.

Hisamov also mentioned another technology, used for high-viscosity oil recovery  - THAI, developed in Canada. It is planned to start applying it this year. Both methods meet ecological requirements, which are rather strict because of shallow depth of heavy oil occurrence, and both allow to produce oil at the depth of 15-30 meters.

Answering to the questions of the seminar participants Hasimov noticed, that Tatneft once carried out a long-term testing of the combustion method for recovery of high-viscosity oil, though it showed too weak performance – 1,5 – 2 tons of oil per day. And we would like to get 25-50 tons of oil per day", - Hasimov said.

Russian high-viscosity oil and bitumen resources are located in Volga-Ural region, Sakhalin, Nenets Autonomous District and Komi Republic.

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The National Center of Technology Innovation was founded in 2007 for the purposes of  of natural resources usage efficiency improvement, import substitution, modernization and development of high-technology industrial enterprises.

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