Sand and steam solutions

Many companies drilling for oil in the Middle East are looking at Canadian technology. Laurie Venning with Regent Energy Group outlines why Canadian companies could be beneficial for improving sand control and improving steam distribution.

Firstly we have lots of experience. In Canada we have a very large number of unconsolidated reservoirs and these sand particles wear on tools and pumps. We began working toward solving heavy oil sand issues over 10 years ago when we started working with the operators. It was determined that a simple, robust sand control solution that mimics a barefoot completion as close as possible, would be optimal for horizontal wells in thermal heavy oil recovery schemes. Regent's solution to these problems has been our patented transverse rolled slotted liner (TRS) completions. We engineer slot widths to retain the erosive reservoir sands but allow for smooth production of a small percentage fines and reservoir fluids. These TRS completion liners worked so well that we carried on in a commercial capacity. 

Secondly, our slotted liners are much superior. Our TRS system creates what we call a true 'keystone' slot. That means the sand will form a stable bridge around each slot. We know the seamed slot self-cleans. We have also developed and patented a new cleaning system, which we call Hot Pig that uses heat to singe off all the burrs and wickers (to 95 percent clean) and thirdly we have completed tremendous amounts of R&D to develop our new slotting machine, 'QAT'. This has allowed us to keep our costs and prices in line and given us a tremendous competitive advantage.

Thirdly, in Canada, we are now very focused on the even distribution of steam. With the help of our customers Regent has focused on steam distribution practices and the reservoirs ability to handle latent heat transfer in order to lower SOR's. The internal tubular configurations are also a factor. Everyone is trying to figure out how to inject steam more efficiently and evenly over the horizontal length - we know we have figured this out. Now, we are waiting for production results to evaluate our models on SOR reduction. These steps give us a huge advantage and we have worked very hard in establishing a partnership approach with our customers.

The Canadian sand control market is dominated by one product as opposed to the products offered for traditional sand control completions. There are many reasons for this. We know our product works and we work extensively with our customers to provide a highly engineered and customised sand control completion for their reservoirs. We have proven that gravel packing is not always the answer. A large part of the world has been sold old practices like cased hole gravel packs without having alternatives. We provide very productive alternatives as our Canadian clients know. We have already shown how our technology works to Occidental Petroleum in the Middle East and our manufacturing plant in the Sultanate of Oman has helped Oxy to drastically increase their production. None of our company's success or growth would have happened if that weren't the case.

Laurie Venning is the founder and Senior Vice President of Regent Energy Group. With over 15 years experience in sand control products and engineering, Venning has helped cultivate a steady stream of new markets, including Latin America and has helped his customers effectively solve many issues concerning the production of heavy oil.