Paraffin Production in Eagle Ford: Learning, Applying, and Executing Out of Box Strategies for Living with This Challenging Issue

Abstract Since the beginning of Eagle Ford development, paraffin production has created significant production losses in wells downhole, well pads and gathering systems. The organization has performed multiple strategies trying to mitigate the problem including chemical injection, hot water/hot oil treatment (downhole) and pigging activities (gathering system). Nevertheless, a formal solution, if something like that exists, has been elusive. Historically, the approach to paraffin issues in the field has been reactive. In 2020, the team began investigating a more proactive approach with the creation of an integrated hydraulic model to improve pigging operations within the gathering system. Also, operational data combined with data analytics techniques was used to identify a specific pattern that revealed more about the deposition process at low pressure and low temperature conditions under which paraffin is regularly observed. This paper will explain that through the discovery of specific pressure trends, at pad level (surface), combined with an unconventional approach for analyzing gas compositional data, it was possible to both detect and predict paraffin deposition at pad level (surface), and in the gathering system, including conditions where paraffin was in suspension (that cannot be observed using conventional tools/methodologies). These workflows completely revolutionized the pigging strategy and ultimately reduced production losses by more than 90%.