Use of Green Burner Technology for Well Cleaning-Experiences and Lessons Learnt

Abstract Conventionally, during clean-up and well-testing operations, it is required to receive fluid from the wellbore to the drilling rig. Due to the unavailability of adequate storage facilities on these rigs, it is typical to flare the hydrocarbons received from the clean-up and testing operations. The problems involved with burning the hydrocarbons during offshore well clean up and testing has been the discharge of hydrocarbon emissions into the air. These gases are a by-product of the incomplete combustion of hydrocarbons, and recent studies have shown deleterious climatic effects of these gases. Due to the poor efficiency of some conventional burners, there are also "fall-outs" during the flaring operations which leave thin oil sheen on the water surface. The oil sheen on the water surface prevents oxygen to get to the phytoplankton, and in extreme cases asphyxiates the sea animals and causing further pollution issues to the marine environment. To mitigate climatic and the environmental issues and ensure conformance to the Nigerian regulatory laws, an optimized burner technology (Green Burner), which addresses incomplete combustion of hydrocarbons and fallout conditions was identified. It was used by Addax Petroleum for flaring hydrocarbons during clean up and testing operations. This paper discusses the effects of flaring with poor systems with low efficiency burning disposal systems, and highlights the advantages of using the Green Burner technology for flaring operations.