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Modeling of wax deposition for water‐in‐oil dispersed flow
Author(s) -
Zhou Yuanxin,
Gong Jing,
Wang Pengyu
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
asia‐pacific journal of chemical engineering
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.348
H-Index - 35
eISSN - 1932-2143
pISSN - 1932-2135
DOI - 10.1002/apj.1948
Subject(s) - wax , emulsion , deposition (geology) , laminar flow , coolant , water in oil , chemical engineering , materials science , cloud point , petroleum engineering , chemistry , composite material , aqueous solution , geology , thermodynamics , organic chemistry , engineering , paleontology , physics , sediment
Wax deposition for waxy crude oil is a long standing issue in oil production and transportation systems. With oil produced with water, the oil–water two‐phase wax deposition becomes a research hotspot. Experiments of water‐in‐oil emulsion wax deposition were conducted in the indoor flow loop. The deposit thickness of emulsion wax deposition shows a trend of increasing after decreasing with water cuts. As the oil or coolant temperature decreases, the gelation phenomena becomes more obvious, and the turning point of the deposit thickness curve versus water cut shifts toward the lower water cut. The influence of gelling adhesion in emulsion wax deposition was discovered. A new model was developed for predicting water‐in‐oil dispersed flow wax deposition based on the mechanisms of molecular diffusion and gelling adhesion. The deposit thickness values predicted by the new wax deposit model for water‐in‐oil emulsion laminar flows with different water cuts agree well with experimental results. © 2015 Curtin University of Technology and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.