Electromagnetically-assisted Catalytic-upgrading of Heavy Oil (ECHO)

为了确保未来的能源安全，必须开发今天被认为是非常规的燃料来源，包括现有的大量重油和沥青储备。尽管加拿大和委内瑞拉拥有大量的此类石油储量，但该技术仍有可能应用于世界其他地区，例如北海部分枯竭井的地下开采。为了尽量减少开采这些储量对环境的影响，尽可能多的加工应在地下进行，从而减少对昂贵的氢气的需求和“地面升级”炼油厂所需的额外能源。该项目旨在开发一个地下的石油升级“工厂”，与石油开采过程本身相结合，这样它的地面足迹最小，并将排放限制在地下。为了实现这一目标，我们将结合使用几种技术：“脚到脚跟空气喷射”（THAI）是一种原位燃烧技术，它燃烧一小部分石油，产生热量，用于热升级和裂解石油分子，以获得运输燃料所需的更轻的成分。以前的研究表明，在地下进行改造是可能的，但需要一种新的解决方案来实现井下处理的最佳条件。特别是，所达到的温度可能不足以达到所需的改善，因此我们将开发和试验微波和欧姆加热的应用，以提高井温并进一步升级。在井中添加催化剂可以通过促进催化裂化反应来提高成品油的性能，从而为成品油带来附加值。然而，之前并没有研究过上述技术的组合应用，因此该项目将结合热和电磁方法，创造一种新的混合技术，能够有效地进行井下改造，并旨在优化催化剂配方，以配合该技术使用。地下存在的特殊和困难的条件需要开发一种新颖的、特殊的催化剂来满足新工艺的特殊需求。这项工作有望提供新的反应器设计，能够将重油升级与微波和/或欧姆加热结合起来，以及可以在油井内原位部署的新型催化剂配方。将收集实验室规模升级数据，以确定这些技术协同工作的效果，并提出可能应用于将该技术引入油藏的规模设计。拟议的技术有望带来许多潜在的好处，包括改善能源安全，创造财富和能源开采行业的就业机会，减少二氧化碳排放，减少开采石油的外部能源需求，英国拥有知识产权和专利。

In order to ensure future energy security, sources of fuel that are considered unconventional today must be developed, including the existing vast heavy oil and bitumen reserves. Although there are large reserves of such oils in Canada and Venezuela, the techniques could potentially be applied in other parts of the World, e.g. sub surface recovery in partially depleted wells in the North Sea. In order to minimise the environmental impact of extraction of these reserves as much of the processing should be done sub-surface as possible, thereby reducing the requirement for expensive hydrogen and additional energy needed in 'surface upgrader' refineries. This project aims to develop an oil upgrading 'plant' to run underground, in conjunction with the oil recovery process itself, such that it has minimal surface footprint and confines emissions underground. In order to do this we will deploy several technologies in combination: Toe-to-Heel Air Injection (THAI) is an in-situ combustion technique which combusts a small fraction of the oil to generate heat for thermal upgrading and cracking of oil molecules to lighter components required for transportation fuels. Previous work has shown that upgrading is potentially possible underground but that a new solution is necessary to achieve the optimum conditions for downhole processing. In particular, the temperature achieved may not be high enough to achieve the required improvement, therefore we will develop and trial the application of microwave and ohmic heating to increase the well temperature and deliver further upgrading. The addition of a catalyst to the well can bring added value to the product oil by facilitating catalytic cracking reactions which improve its properties. However the application of the above techniques in combination has not been previously investigated, hence this project will combine thermal and electromagnetic approaches to create a new hybrid technology capable of efficient downhole upgrading, and aims to optimise the catalyst formulation to use with this technology. The special and difficult conditions that exist underground require the development of a novel, idiosyncratic catalyst to meet the particular needs of the new process.The work is expected to deliver new reactor designs capable of combining heavy oil upgrading with microwave and/or ohmic heating and novel catalyst formulations that could be deployed in-situ within the oil well. Laboratory scale upgrading data will be collected to determine how well these techniques work together and process scale up designs proposed that could potentially be applied to take the technology in to the oil reservoir. The proposed technologies are expected to deliver a number of potential benefits including improved energy security, wealth creation and employment in the energy extraction industry, reduced carbon dioxide emissions, reduced external energy requirement in extracting the oil, UK held intellectual property and patents.