Gas Lift Forms

According to many industry experts, Gas Lift is the least understood artificial lift method, but its complexity is not the reason behind its misunderstanding. Instead, the challenge behind Gas Lift is that after implementing a lousy design, the well will often keep producing, unlike other artificial lift methods (e.g., ESP) that stop producing. Thus, operators fail to recognize design errors that restrain production.

Therefore, there is a significant potential to increase production by engineers who understand the Gas Lift principle. Hence, professionals in the oil industry need to understand how this activation method works to make the most effective use of resources.

This Gas Lift training outlines the gas lift system through multiple configurations found in the oil industry, also known as the forms of Gas Lift. It introduces a typical Gas Lift system and explains what Gas Lift is. It explains the most common form, i.e., continuous Gas Lift, and the other common forms of Gas Lift, such as Intermittent Gas Lift, Plunger Lift, Annular Flow, or Dual Gas Lift Completion, are also presented. Moreover, you will also find rarer forms of Gas Lift like Pig Lift or Gas Lift combined with other artificial lift methods.

This lesson is the 1st of a series of 5 designed to help you reach an advanced level in Gas Lift oil production and operations. It is followed by the courses ‘Gas Lift Equipment’, ‘Gas Lift Unloading Sequence and Mandrel Spacing Design’, ‘Gas Lift Optimization and Design with Existing Mandrels’, and ‘Gas Lift Troubleshooting’.

Objectives:

Participants will acquire a good knowledge of the existing forms of gas lift activation. Pros & cons of each configuration will be discussed giving the participants the ability judge if a better form of GL is available for their well.

Curriculum:

• GL system
• GL principle & continuous GL
• Intermittent GL
• Plunger lift
• Chamber lift
• Dual GL completion
• Concentric GL
• Self GL
• Annular flow
• Side string injection
• Pig lift
• Packerless GL
• GL as a backup for ESP
• GL & jet or hydraulic piston pump

Designed for:

• Production, Petroleum or Well Performance Engineers to explore the possible GL configurations available for their wells
• Field Production Personnel to understand the principle of activation of their GL wells and what parameters they should pay attention to
• Completion or Surface Facilities Engineers to understand what they can do to help designing and optimizing the right GL configuration for each well.

Pre-requisites:

• Understanding of the well production mechanisms (inflow & outlfow) is preferred
• Basic knowledge on well architecture
• Awareness on the oilfield terms