Downhole gas separator increases beam-pumped well production

Reducing the operating cost of beam-pumped wells is a major concern in today`s economy. Numerous studies of the motor or power unit, surface pumping system, rod string and downhole pump have been performed to improve the performance and efficiency of beam-pumped systems. As part of these efforts, the total well management (TWM) concept was developed to facilitate the optimization of a pumping system. While collecting field measurements as part of the TWM development, it was found that in oil wells that produce gas up the casing annulus, the inefficient separation of gas from liquid at the pump inlet often resulted in poor pump performance and low overall efficiency of the entire pumping system. This can be verified by a dynamometer pump card, which indicates considerable free gas in the pump even through liquid is present in the casing annulus in the form of a highly gaseous liquid column. This observation led to the study of existing down-hole gas separators followed by field testing and development of a novel separator design.