An Alternative for Saving Gas Burnt in Well-Testing Operation by Using MPFM— A Case Study

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Abstract TOTAL E&P INDONESIE, one of Production Sharing Contractors in Indonesia, manages its field located in East Kalimantan, Indonesia. Under well servicing department, one of its activities in support and service operation is well testing. The scope of work consists of production test, offload, clean up, start up and support data acquisition. There are some challenges faced in well testing activity, both in environment and operation point of view. In environment point of view, it happens frequently that the tested fluid cannot be routed back to the flow line or production network because of some reasons. Since the tested flow cannot be re-routed, it can only be released to the environment after formerly burnt. So, reducing the amount of gas burnt becomes one of the environmental challenges in well testing. In operation point of view, the requirement of well testing is increasing from time to time. To fulfill the demand, more testing unit is required from time to time. The testing unit can be a testing barge or a MPFM, either a complete package of MPFM on a dedicated self-propelled barge, or just a portable MPFM unit mounted on other barge with other unit on it (e.g. portable MPFM mounted on slick line barge). In Tunu – Tambora field, the average volume of annual flaring is approximately 1,900 mmscf. This amount is apportioned among gas burnt resulting from offload, clean up, start up, production test, MRPL, and BPT. Gas burnt from production test, MRPL, and BPT operation is potentially saved by using MPFM. Gas from offload (atmospheric pressure) is also possible to be re-routed to production network with the installation of multiphase pump at the return line. Potential gas recovered through MPFM based on the percentage of gas burnt resulted from production test, MRPL and BPT is more or less 590 mmscf per year. With this value, approximately US$ 1.5 MM per year can be saved with the assumption that only 80% of the potential gas is recovered.