Abstract
Contribution of heavy oil in total oil production in Colombia has shown an increase year after year, currently representing around 50% of the market. The challenge for Artificial Lift is to offer an efficient design to obtaining an economical solution for wells of heavy oil with high pumping costs and failure rate.
Use of Long Stroke Pumping Units extends the operating range for reciprocation rod lift and represents a cost-efficient alternative instead of electrical submersible pumps (ESP) to produce oil wells with low to medium productions (up to a production rate of 1,500 STB/D) where operational and energetic optimization is needed. In wells with a high frequency of failures, long stroke pumping units can reduce rod failure, prevents pump problems, increases run lifes, and reduce workover costs.
Since March 2014, four artificial lift conversions to Beam Pumping were implemented in Maranta Block achieving significant reductions in operation and intervention costs compared to artificial lift system previously installed in each well (Electric Submersible Pumps - ESP). These savings are mainly represented by reducing of electric consumption around 79% and increasing run life 2.8 times that result in less production losses and workover costs considering fewer corrective interventions.
