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A New Model for Predicting Slug Flow Liquid Holdup in Vertical Pipes with Different Viscosities

  • Research Article - Petroleum Engineering
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Abstract

The development of heavy oil has attracted attention in recent times. With increasing fluid viscosity, slug flow has become the most common flow pattern in oil and gas pipeline flow. The accurate prediction of slug flow parameters is an urgent problem to be solved in heavy oil development. In this paper, gas–liquid two-phase flow experiments with different viscosities were carried out in a 60-mm vertical pipe. The superficial velocity ranges of gas and liquid were 0.51–7.42 m/s and 0.08–0.21 m/s, respectively. Based on the measured data, the investigation revealed that liquid holdup increases with an increase in viscosity and superficial liquid velocity. This study presents a new liquid holdup model of slug flow for viscous two-phase flow in vertical pipes. Based on the statistical analysis, the proposed correlation accurately predicts the liquid holdup of slug flow in a vertical pipe for the present measured data and performs best in comparison with existing correlations.

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Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful to everyone at the Branch of Key Laboratory of CNPC for Oil and Gas Production. This work was supported by the National Natural Science Found Project (No. 61572084) and National Key Scientific and Technological Project (2016ZX05056004-002, 2017ZX05030-005).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Petroleum Engineering College, Yangtze University, Wuhan Campus, No. 111, Caidian Street, Caidian District, Wuhan, 430100, Hubei Province, China

    Zilong Liu, Ruiquan Liao, Wei Luo & Joseph X. F. Ribeiro

  2. The Multiphase Flow Laboratory of Gas Lift Innovation Centre, CNPC, Wuhan Campus, No. 111, Caidian Street, Caidian District, Wuhan, 430100, Hubei Province, China

    Zilong Liu, Ruiquan Liao, Wei Luo & Joseph X. F. Ribeiro

  3. Oil and Gas Technology Research Institute, Changqing Oilfield Branch Company, PetroChina, Xi’an, 710021, Shanxi, China

    Yubin Su

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  1. Zilong Liu
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  2. Ruiquan Liao
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Correspondence to Ruiquan Liao.

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Liu, Z., Liao, R., Luo, W. et al. A New Model for Predicting Slug Flow Liquid Holdup in Vertical Pipes with Different Viscosities. Arab J Sci Eng 45, 7741–7750 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13369-019-04308-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13369-019-04308-5

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