Almost always crude oil is produced in conjunction with associated gas and for the type of reservoir considered in this study, gas production rate over time increases with decreasing pressure. The problem of maimizing production and/or recovery can be addressed by adopting an innovative, multi-stage separation technique. We use theoretical analysis and the latest version of Aspen HYSYS to demonstrate process plant optimization of a real case study of a separation facility in Nigeria's Niger Delta area with the objective to achieve higher plant profitability than those achieved by current practice. Based on the estimation of the optimum separator pressures for a 48,470 bbl/day crude oil and 50.27 MMSCFD gas production facility, it is found that crude oil and associated gas recovery increased by 1,620-bbl/day and 0.21 MMSCFD, respectively. Compared to current practice at the facility, a yearly average of fourteen million US dollars would be realized by our improved multi-stage separation method.
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