A Novel Technique to Determine Concentration-Dependent Solvent Dispersion in Vapex

Hadil Abukhalifeh, Ali Lohi and Simant Ranjan Upreti
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Hadil Abukhalifeh: Department of Chemical Engineering, Ryerson University, 350 Victoria Street, Toronto, Ontario, M5B 2K3, Canada
Ali Lohi: Department of Chemical Engineering, Ryerson University, 350 Victoria Street, Toronto, Ontario, M5B 2K3, Canada
Simant Ranjan Upreti: Department of Chemical Engineering, Ryerson University, 350 Victoria Street, Toronto, Ontario, M5B 2K3, Canada

Energies, 2009, vol. 2, issue 4, 1-22

Abstract: Vapex (vapor extraction of heavy oil and bitumen) is a promising recovery technology because it consumes low energy, and is very environmentally-friendly. The dispersion of solvents into heavy oil and bitumen is a crucial transport property governing Vapex. The accurate determination of solvent dispersion in Vapex is essential to effectively predict the amount and time scale of oil recovery as well to optimize the field operations. In this work, a novel technique is developed to experimentally determine the concentration-dependent dispersion coefficient of a solvent in Vapex process. The principles of variational calculus are utilized in conjunction with a mass transfer model of the experimental Vapex process. A computational algorithm is developed to optimally compute solvent dispersion as a function of its concentration in heavy oil. The developed technique is applied to Vapex utilizing propane as a solvent. The results show that dispersion of propane is a unimodal function of its concentration in bitumen.

Keywords: concentration-dependent dispersion; Vapex; propane; heavy oil and bitumen; variational calculus; mathematical modeling (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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