Perpustakaan Digital ITB

Liquid loading represents a major operational challenge in mature gas field developments, depleting well productivity as natural reservoir pressure declines. This study presents an integrated modeling approach and a comparative analysis of five critical velocity correlations, namely Turner et al., Coleman et al., Nossier et al., Li et al., and Belfroid et al., to optimize continuous gas lift (CGL) design across various deviated wellbore trajectories (0°, 15°, 30°, and 45°). The evaluation reveals that the Nossier et al. correlation establishes the highest critical velocity (vcrit) of 2.29 m/s at the surface, whereas the Li et al. correlation yields the lowest value of 0.75 m/s. Crucially, the determination of the gas lift injection rate is conducted by increasing the superficial gas velocity to exceed the critical liquid loading velocity. CGL sensitivity analysis indicates minimum injection rate requirements of 6,040–6,848 sm³/day (Li et al.), 24,082–36,830 sm³/day (Belfroid et al.), 24,843–25.721 sm³/day (Coleman et al.), 31,746–32.619 sm³/day (Turner et al.), and 38,350–39,204 sm³/day (Nossier et al.). Implementing these rates enhances the total cumulative gas production (production gain) by 1.1040%–1.2570% (Li et al.), 4.3935%–6.7320% (Belfroid et al.), 4.5315%–4.7085% (Coleman et al.), 5.7855%–5.9655% (Turner et al.), and 6.9840%–7.1640% (Nossier et al.).