Production Throughput Efficiency Model for Prudhoe Bay
Authors: Rogers Charles L. , Patterson Don R. 
Published: December 2007

American Institute of Mining, Metallurgical, and Petroleum Engineers, Inc.

This paper was prepared for the 48th Annual Fall Meeting of the Society of Petroleum Engineers of AIME, to be held in Las Vegas, Nev., Sept. 30-Oct. 3, 1973. Permission to copy is restricted to an abstract of not more than 300 words. Illustrations may not be copied. The abstract should contain conspicuous acknowledgment of where and by whom the paper is presented. Publication elsewhere after publication in the JOURNAL OF PETROLEUM TECHNOLOGY or the SOCIETY OF PETROLEUM ENGINEERS JOURNAL is usually granted upon request to the Editor of the appropriate journal provided agreement to give proper credit is made.

Discussion of this paper is invited. Three copies of any discussion should be sent to the Society of Petroleum Engineers office. Such discussion may be presented at the above meeting and, with the paper, may be considered for publication in one of the two SPE magazines.

High throughput efficiency is of vital concern to the Prudhoe Bay Field. Because of its size, remote location, and limited on-site storage, the effects of component malfunctions which can cause production bottlenecks must be identified as early as possible. production bottlenecks must be identified as early as possible. To meet this need, Atlantic Richfield Company developed a computer model which simulates the daily flow of oil and gas throughout the production system. The engineers use the model to guide them in production system. The engineers use the model to guide them in designing the facilities so as to optimize total field production. This entails selecting the optimum size, number, brand name, etc, of components to effect that goal.

Introduction

The Prudhoe Bay Field is an extraordinary engineering challenge in many ways. Its size and remote location are obvious contributing factors. It is anticipated that the field will be unitized. The west end of the field will be operated by British Petroleum and the east end by Atlantic Richfield. British Petroleum will operate the power generation plant which will serve the entire field. Atlantic Richfield will operate a central gas compression and injection facility to serve the whole field, plus a fuel gas facility to serve both operators and the Trans-Alaska Pipeline north of the Brooks Range. The production facilities of both operators will be oversized to provide partial backup capacity for the other in the event of loss of production capacity in a flow station or gathering center. Because of the high cost of tankage, the pour point of the crude, and the low ambient temperatures, above-ground storage of crude must be minimized. For all of these reasons, there is a need for a closer than normal interrelationship between operators and between operators and pipeline. These factors, plus the large size of the production system being designed-and therefore, the large economic production system being designed-and therefore, the large economic stakes-make it mandatory that we consider in depth the overall system throughput efficiency. Production system designers need the capability to determine the effective throughput of the system so as to maximize the economic performance of the entire system.

For the most complex systems, overall system production efficiency (actual throughput divided by design throughput) is not readily apparent nor easily determined analytically.