PARC400® and Hot Oiling

Hot oil treatment, or "Hot-oiling", is a common method used to remove paraffin and asphaltene. Hot-oiling, however, has serious drawbacks that prevent it from being the primary method of paraffin and asphaltene removal in petroleum production. The use of PARC400® in conjunction with hot oil can decrease or eliminate most of those drawbacks.

To understand how PARC400® Chemical makes the hot oil treatment more effective and increase their safety we must first look into how hot-oiling actually works and each of the associated drawbacks.

When hot oil treatments are used, they are typically used for the removal of deposited paraffin and asphaltene in the tubing. Oil removed from a nearby storage tank is heated, then pumped down the annulus. While the hot oil is moving
down the annulus, it comes in contact with the outside of the tubing and begins to melt the
deposited paraffin and asphaltene from the outside in.

While the pumping continues the paraffin and asphaltene is melted and removed along with produced oil. It is important to note that in most cases the hot oil used will be too cold by the time it comes back through the tubing to melt any paraffin or asphaltene deposited in the tubing. The heat loss through the casing and tubing is very high, hence, most of the work the hot oil does, it does on its way down.

Following are the main factors leading to problems associated with traditional hot oil treatments:

1. The oil used is usually removed from the bottom of the tank; hence, it has the highest content of paraffin and asphaltene than the remaining oil in the tank.
2. The oil used is usually removed from the closest tank to the problem well, thus the oil will have more paraffin and asphaltene than if the oil was removed from another tank where no wax problems are observed.
3. The hot oil process leads to the evaporation of some light ends in the crude, causing the treating oil to contain even more of the heavier ends.
4. By the time the hot oil reaches the formation, it has lost most of its heat, hence has no further melting ability.
5. The hot oil pumping rate down the annulus is usually far greater than the wells ability to pump the oil out of the well. Therefore, in wells with low reservoir pressure, a large amount of the oil used will end up going back into the formation before it can be re-produced.

Because of the above, traditional hot oil treatments are considered to be the primary reason for formation damage as the paraffin and asphaltene introduced with the hot oil are now forced into the formation. The lower the formation porosity, the higher the probability of serious formation damage when hot-oiling.

The way PARC400® helps overcome these problems when used in conjunction with hot oil treatments is as follows:

1. PARC400® has been specifically designed to remove paraffin and asphaltene using several mechanisms. It is a solvent, dispersant, crystal modifier and inhibitor all in one.
2. PARC400® increases the solvency effects of the hot oil and holds the melted paraffin in solution even after the oil cools down due to its crystal modifier effects.
3. As the PARC400® treated hot oil goes into the formation, it further helps remove prior heavy hydrocarbon formation damage.
4. As the PARC400® treated oil comes back, it continues to dissolve the wax in the tubing, the flow lines and the storage tanks.