American Oil and Gas Reporter - May 2015 - 85

Optimizes
Facility Design
For Producing
Multiwell Pads

By Michael W. Conder and April D. Schroer

DENVER-In tight oil plays such as the Niobrara, Bakken and Eagle Ford, multiwell pads with four

or more high-volume horizontal wells-often producing multiphase liquid and gas streams-require

production facilities that approach the cost and engineering sophistication of full-scale natural gas
processing plants.

Facility designs for conventional vertical oil fields entail comparatively limited mechanical

engineering and minimal gas handling process considerations. With one well per pad, basin-

speciﬁc standardized designs with "one-size-ﬁts-all" equipment typically are suﬃcient. However,
the advent of multiwell pads in horizontal plays has transformed the size and complexity of

pad-level processing equipment into signiﬁcant production facilities that rival the cost and
engineering complications of full-scale natural gas processing plants.

Ever-stricter clean air requirements also are impacting trends in engineering pad production

facilities, leading to improved production and extensive vapor recovery of flash gas to minimize

or eliminate venting. This trend is further compounding facility design challenges that already are

challenged by low oil prices, forcing a revised focus on reducing the capital cost of production
facilities to improve overall production economics. As a result, new facility projects have

transitioned quickly from being schedule-driven to cost-driven, and optimizing gas handling has
become critical to recognizing the economic beneﬁts of tight oil development.

These tighter process design requirements, in turn, mandate new approaches to engineering

production facilities. That includes making better use of available information, such as

pressure/volume/temperature (PVT) data and implementing advanced oil characterization and
simulation methods that are not necessarily familiar to many onshore facility engineers.

MAY 2015 85

American Oil and Gas Reporter - May 2015

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Oil and Gas Reporter - May 2015

Contents
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