Effect of Flow Rate on Paraffin Accumulation in Plastic, Steel, and Coated Pipe

Published in Petroleum Transactions, AIME, Volume 213, 1958, pages 80–84. Introduction The accumulation of paraffin deposits in tubular goods has been recognized as a major production problem since the inception of the petroleum industry. This problem is not limited to any particular geographical area nor is it limited to a specific type of crude oil. Generally speaking, "paraffin" deposition pertains to the deposition of any predominantly organic material in flow lines, and possibly even at the sand face, which would hamper the production of oil. In some fields, a continuous effort is required to remove deposits of paraffin and in order to accomplish this, many unique methods have been devised. The best solution to this problem, however, is to prevent the formation of such deposits. One method which has been tried in a number of fields is the use of plastic pipe. The purpose of this investigation is to compare the relative effectiveness of several plastic materials to aid in the reduction or prevention of paraffin accumulations in surface flow lines. Composition of Paraffin Deposits By definition, paraffin deposits are those materials which are insoluble in crude oil at the prevailing producing conditions of temperature and pressure. Such deposits usually consist of small particles of petroleum wax intermixed with resins, asphaltic material, and crude oil. They may also contain a variety of foreign materials such as sand, silt, water, various metal oxides, sulfates and carbonates of iron, barium, and calcium. The petroleum waxes deposited in flow strings usually consist of both a "hard" and a "soft" wax fraction. These waxes are largely aliphatic hydrocarbons with smaller amounts of aromatic and naphthenic compounds. Nathan has classified the hard and soft wax fractions. The aliphatic hydrocarbons present are those of high molecular weight with high melting points. Reistle pointed out that these high molecular weight compounds first separate from the oil due to a sharp decrease in solubility as the melting point increases. The identification of the resins and asphaltic materials rests, at present, on an arbitrary solubility procedure. Under certain conditions, materials which are insoluble in pentane (ASTM D–893) are defined as resins and asphalts. Subgrouping of these materials is made on decreasing solubility in benzene and carbon disulfide. Shock found some correlation between the solvent response and the pentane insoluble content of paraffins; higher pentane insoluble fractions are less soluble in any of the commonly used commercial solvents.