WILSA EWC Enhances Recovery in West Texas Flowback

WILSA's technology improves efficiency of existing separation equipment, maximizing oil production and delivering cleaner water for potential reuse
Date: Jul -Aug 2014

Industry: Oil & Gas Production

Application: Frac Flowback

Success Factors:

  • Increased oil recovery
  • Less oil in disposed water
  • Simple flowback process improvement
  • Ease of installation into existing piping system

WILSA® EWC Results:

  • Increased efficiency of 3-phase separator to >99.9%
  • Lowered oil content in water discharged from separators from >10,000 ppm (1%) to an average of 25.4 ppm

An operator in West Texas was processing frac flowback having 12% to 28% oil content through an undersized 3-phase knockout unit.

Water discharged from the separator had an oil content ranging from 1.5% to 3.6%. A solution was required to improve oil/water separation and reduce the amount of OIW (oil in water) transported to disposal wells.

A WILSA® EWC G4 was installed upstream of the 3-phase separator, processing on average 30 bbls/hour. Although flow rates fluctuated, the

retention time of flowback fluid flowing through the separator was limited to only ~10 minutes.

No chemicals were injected into the fluid upstream of the separator. Flowback water separated by the knockout unit was directed to water collection frac tanks.

After the in-line installation of the EWC upstream of the separator, more oil was recovered from the flowback fluid and cleaner water was discharged to the water collection frac tanks for disposal.