Trialing Technologies that will Reduce Emissions in Oil and Gas Operations
Funded through Round 2: Industrial Energy Efficiency in 2011, the project involved field trials of 10 different technologies and operational initiatives across ConocoPhillips’ assets. The primary goal for these trials was to cut emissions and improve asset efficiency while encouraging the broader adoption of these technologies across the oil and gas industry by sharing the results.
ConocoPhillips set out to install and field‐test several technologies to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions at certain types of facilities that are common to all conventional oil and gas operations in Alberta. The technologies chosen for this project were new at the time and potentially viable for the whole industry, but were yet to be widely adopted. The 10 technologies tested included: high‐to‐low/no bleed conversions for pneumatic devices, REMVue® AFRC and Slipstream®, gas plant assessments, solar chemical injection pumps, dehydration optimization, waste heat recovery, pressure drop to electricity, waste heat to electricity and vent gas capture/utilization. The project successfully achieved annual GHG reductions equivalent to over 90,000 tonnes of emissions, surpassing the original project targets. The project also managed to reduce the average cost of GHG reduction to about seven dollars per tonne, which was significantly lower than initially estimated.
Shifting Focus to Reduce Emissions
The initial target for the program was to reduce GHG emissions by 50,000 tonnes of emissions per year. However, due to a shift in focus towards the projects that showed early success, the program resulted in reductions of over 90,000 tonnes of emissions per year. Of the technologies tested, the most successful were high-to-low/no bleed instrument conversions, dehydration optimization, solar-powered chemical injection pumps, gas pneumatic pump vent gas capture/utilization, and engine fuel management systems (REMVue and SlipStream). The success of these technologies was generally related to ease of implementation, cost and reliability of the technology. Conversely, waste heat recovery, vent gas to engine air intake (SlipStream), gas pneumatic pump vent gas capture/utilization, waste heat to electricity and pressure drop to electricity technologies were deemed not mature enough to be implemented industry wide. This is because the technologies face challenges such as economic feasibility, safety concerns, large-scale implementation readiness and technical/operability practicality when implemented within ConocoPhillips operations.
What’s next?
At the time of this project’s completion, many of these technologies appeared to be sufficiently mature to be implemented industry-wide and were implemented at a large-scale within the ConocoPhillips operations with reasonably few challenges. Since this project’s completion, ERA has funded a variety of projects to electrify pneumatic devices. Additionally, engine fuel management systems such as REMVue and SlipStream are now widely used in the oil and gasindustry to prevent methane leaks.