Never has the energy sector faced as many challenges as it is today. With the outbreak of conflict between Russia and Ukraine combined with pressing global warming concerns, the industry’s greatest minds have been hard at work in coming up with solutions to ensure that the sector can sustain profitable growth while remaining committed to its net-zero objectives. Those who had the pleasure of attending the 8th EOG Convention enjoyed the unique opportunity of participating in this event’s technical sessions, which featured a wide variety of speakers, presentations, and revealing case studies. This year at the convention, EOG brings the latest developments that are happening all over the industry.

Key Trends in Decarbonization Technologies

The first technical session of the 8th Egypt Oil & Gas Convention featured six presentations discussing the key trends in decarbonization technologies.

During the session, Mohamed Kamal Gaber, Senior Process & Pipeline Design Engineer at Petrojet, gave a presentation titled “Flared Gas Recovery”, featuring a successful case study from Petrojet. The presentation introduced the definition of flare gas, why it is necessary to cut flare gas, and concluded by the successful case study from Petrojet.

Meanwhile, Mohamed Ibrahim from GUPCO, made a presentation on the roadmap for oil and gas operations greenhouse gas emissions neutrality in GUPCO Ras Shukier onshore field.  The presentation discussed how the whole world is going toward green and carbon neutrality very quickly after COVID19, and how the oil and gas sector in Egypt is targeting zero carbon emissions at some targets, Ibrahim further discussed the six projects GUPCO Ras Shukier’s plan to become carbon neutral.

Additionally, Yosr Omar, ESG Business Development Manager at NESR, talked about how harvesting geothermal energy from produced reservoir fluids eliminates emissions from production capacity operations. It tackled what other sources of power can be generated. Yosry further discussed harvesting geothermal energy, using it as electricity, how it reduces emissions, and introducing new technology to the power market.

Then Radwa Mourad Tman, Senior PhD Chemical Engineer at GUPCO, made a presentation on flare system optimization and emissions control. The presentation discussed why reducing carbon emissions is necessary immediately, highlighting the current technologies that are used to calculate the emissions and how the rebel effect technology that they are using is depending on heat value and exit velocity of the flare itself and of the fuel gas.

Additionally, Ehab Mohamed from ENAP talked about flared gas utilization power generation for remote oil fields, zero flaring eventually pays off. It tackled how ENAP is committed to achieving zero flare emissions. Ehab further explained ENAP’S way to achieve zero flaring and the economic benefit of the project.

Finally, Waleed El Sabe, Principal Mechanical Engineer at Enppi, made a presentation on energy efficiency and decarbonization solutions for oil and gas projects using the ORC system. It tackled Enppni’s efforts in energy-efficient solutions, the organic ranking cycle technology, and its application in the Dahshur gas plant.

Efficiency in Operations

The second technical session of Egypt Oil & Gas’ 8th convention featured three presentations discussing Efficiency in operations.

During the session, Mahmoud Sayed, Senior Specialist Production Technology at Kuwait Energy Egypt (KEE), gave a presentation entitled ‘Challenging of Maximizing Brown Field Production in High Artificial Lift Failures Frequency Environment as a Result of Wells Harsh Conditions.’ The presentation introduces the AREA-A wells’ nature and challenges, explaining sand production challenges, approaches and solutions. Sayed discussed the high conductivity reservoir challenges, oversized sucker rod pumps, KEE controlling failures frequency methodology, and approaches.

Meanwhile, Ehab Ahmed Abd ElHamid, Facilities and Maintenance Manager at PetroNefertiti Oil Company, gave a presentation on the economic and environmental impact of using flared gas and fuel, featuring a case study from PetroNefertiti Oil Company. The presentation discussed how to stop the gas flare and reduce carbon emissions, explaining how to use the available resources to switch the fuel type from diesel to gas. Abd ElHamid talked about using the power system for remote areas that are far away from the national grid. The presentation tackled assuring the sustainability of the project and the ability to apply this project in greenfields or brownfields.

Additionally, Tarek ElShennawy, Manager of Electrical Engineering Sector & Energy Manager at the Alexandria National Refining & Petrochemicals Company (ANRPC), talked about the variable speed drives (VSDs) for energy saving in pump and fan applications. The presentation featured a case study for VSDs in a refinery. It tackled energy appraisal and economic analysis. ElShennawy further discussed the advantages and limitations of VSDs in his presentation.

Asset Integrity Challenges & Opportunities

All over the world, assets have to deal with all types of challenges. These obstacles not only stand as a threat to energy security but also have severe effects on profits and production. For this reason, asset integrity is an integral part of how the petroleum sector can work more efficiently. The issue has been a subject of deep discussion among oil and gas experts for many years. During the second day of the 8th Egypt Oil & Gas Convention, asset integrity was the specific of the event’s third technical session titled “Asset Integrity Challenges & Opportunities”.

The session witnessed four presentations, the first of which was “Structural Aspects of GUPCO Well Integrity Management System” by Mohamed Mostafa Ashraf, who is the Petroleum Engineering Section Head at Gulf of Suez Petroleum Company (GUPCO).

It was followed by yet another informative presentation by Halliburton’s Wael Korosh titled “Successful Transition from A Legacy Well Integrity Management System to an Integrated, Expandable Platform”. As the company’s Drilling and Completions Advisor, Korosh discussed a number of innovative ideas that interested and engaged the audience.

For the session’s third presentation titled “Assessing the Impact Risk of Gathering New Sour Gas Wells with Original Sweet Ones”, Mohamed Abouhashem, Senior HSE Engineer at Belayim Petroleum Company (Petrobel) talked about an interesting and inspirational field case study.

The third session was concluded with a presentation titled “Asset Integrity Management (AIM): Challenges and Strategies for Successful Implementation” by Mohamed ElHabbal, AIM Program Manager/ Assistant General Manager Offshore Division at Enppi. The main goal of ElHabbal’s talk was to explore the challenges and best strategies for the purpose of achieving efficient AIM systems.

Outstanding Solutions for Improving Production

The fourth technical Session of the 8th Convention, provided very interesting and informative four presentations on how to improve oil and gas production.

Mohamed El-Ghamry, WEPCO’s Geophysics Section Head, added a scientifically enlightening perspective in his presentation titled “Turning Plug and Abandonment Dry Wells From Disasters to New Discoveries: Case Study Bed-1 Brownfield Western Desert, Egypt”. His study aims to maximize production form field BED-1 through using dry, abandonment and long shut- in wells. El-Ghamry concluded that this strategy pumped reserves to BED – 1 well reached 12 million barrels (mmbl).

Another presentation titled “Unlock Unseen Development Potential in Brown Field: Case Study Shahd SE Field”, was provided by Mohammed Ismael, ENAP Sipetrol’s Operations Manager. He discussed how the data acquisition, repeated analysis, and evaluation workflows could uncover unseen potentials reach to around 9 million stock tank barrels of original hydrocarbon in place. He elaborated that the key to such successful workflow is the integration between different data analysis and how to eliminate the uncertainties by more data acquisition and uncertainties assessment.

Additionally, Maria Vazquez from SLB, Mohamed Soliman and Mohamed Tarek from SUCO offered an informative presentation titled “Improving Existing Perforations Efficiency with Innovative Dynamic Underbalance Implosion Technique, Enhanced Productivity in Ras Budran Field”.  He evaluated the production of Ras Badran after applying underbalance implosion technique. He concluded this technique succeeded to improve the production rates reaching to 1.5 mmbl and double the remaining reserves.

Mostafa Kortam from Petrobel introduced a presentation titled “Neutral-wettability Proppant Improves Post Treatment Cleanup and Enhances Productivity”. In his presentation, he tried to solve sand production problem recommending to use Garvel Pack and Frac Pack techniques. His study proved that no sand formation produced by using Gravel Pack technique. It also led to 100% recovery of pumped brine and increased the productivity index (PI) by around 15% compared to offset wells.