Power Outage..

[svauto-erotic855]

Oh I forgot whom I’m talking to, the guy who knows everybody and everything. Yeah I don’t know shit I only used to instal wellheads after drilling and before production. But please go on.

You’re assuming you know the reservoir pressure as well as the casing and tubing pressures for a typical gas well. I’d be willing to bet you don’t. I’d also be willing to bet the pressure drop you seem to think is happening isn’t as substantial across a 18,000ft length to surface.

What the pressure is, and the gas involved does not matter. A simple sharp radius inside a fitting that was not deburred can start the icing as long as the ice has a surface to begin forming on and the flow is high enough. Any and every gas that exist can freeze. It does not matter if there's 10 bazilian pounds of pressure behind it. This is physics 101. FYI, installing wellheads means you know how to do pipe fitting and doesn't mean you know shit about what's going on inside of it any more than the guy welding the hull of Submarine knows how the nuclear reactor works. Ask the guy that engineered the system that you were installing if the wellhead can freeze and you'll find that what I'm telling you is true. Why do you think nitrous oxide gets extremely cold when it transitions from a liquid to a gas? The same thing can happen with a gas when there is a pressure drop.

[Trip McNeely]

What the pressure is, and the gas involved does not matter. A simple sharp radius inside a fitting that was not deburred can start the icing as long as the ice has a surface to begin forming on and the flow is high enough. Any and every gas that exist can freeze. It does not matter if there's 10 bazilian pounds of pressure behind it. This is physics 101. FYI, installing wellheads means you know how to do pipe fitting and doesn't mean you know shit about what's going on inside of it any more than the guy welding the hull of Submarine knows how the nuclear reactor works. Ask the guy that engineered the system that you were installing if the wellhead can freeze and you'll find that what I'm telling you is true. Why do you think nitrous oxide gets extremely cold when it transitions from a liquid to a gas? The same thing can happen with a gas when there is a pressure drop.

Haha. I’d put my field knowledge against your Wikipedia and whatever else you reference for any of your bullshit you ever post all day. Again, active flowing wellheads don’t freeze AT the wellhead due to outdoor ambient temperatures. Could reservoir pressure be affected downhole? Sure but that isn’t due to outdoor ambient temperature.

[Broncojohnny]

Haha. I’d put my field knowledge against your Wikipedia and whatever else you reference for any of your bullshit you ever post all day. Again, active flowing wellheads don’t freeze AT the wellhead due to outdoor ambient temperatures. Could reservoir pressure be affected downhole? Sure but that isn’t due to outdoor ambient temperature.

What is the pressure of natural gas in a typical well? And what does it get reduced to in the line? I'm just curious. I assume the pressure goes down as the well gets older.

SVO, stop turning this into a physics debate, no one cares except for you. Go clean some pools or something.

[Trip McNeely]

What is the pressure of natural gas in a typical well? And what does it get reduced to in the line? I'm just curious. I assume the pressure goes down as the well gets older.

SVO, stop turning this into a physics debate, no one cares except for you. Go clean some pools or something.

Your typical surface wellhead equipment is rated at 10,000 lbs, I've seen some also at 15,000 for deeper formations. Now it will vary on casing size, tubing size and total length of both. Tubing is what flows production and is inside casing which flows for frac.ing and before completion. There are lots of variables.

[Trip McNeely]

You frac a well after its cased. Once its flowing after frac.ing, then you install a smaller diameter pipe called tubing and that's what ultimately is the production pipe. Tubing is like 2-7/8" OD. your smaller casing sizes are around 4"-5-1/2" OD x whatever length you have to the reservoir. We were going 18-20,000' vertical and lateral into the Marcellus. Utica is even more.

[svauto-erotic855]

Haha. I’d put my field knowledge against your Wikipedia and whatever else you reference for any of your bullshit you ever post all day. Again, active flowing wellheads don’t freeze AT the wellhead due to outdoor ambient temperatures. Could reservoir pressure be affected downhole? Sure but that isn’t due to outdoor ambient temperature.

If you go back and read my previous post I very specifically said well heads do not freeze because of cold weather. Freezing happens because of flow, velocity of flow, volume of flow, the type of gas moving, and whatever pressure drops are within the system. This is not Wikipedia knowledge, this is stuff I have first-hand experience with. I've dealt with cryogenic liquids and gases on many occasions. It doesn't matter what the gas is, any gas can freeze. How do you think an air conditioning system works? A liquid is forced through an orifice where there is a pressure drop and a phase transition. The same thing can happen with a gas but the transition is not as dramatic.

Edit: It doesn't matter if it's a Wellhead or a manifold with a bunch of fittings and valves. Anywhere there is a pressure drop in the system there is a chance of freezing. When the volume of flow goes up the probability of icing goes up at the same time. Lower ambient temperatures can contribute to that.

[Trip McNeely]

If you go back and read my previous post I very specifically said well heads do not freeze because of cold weather. Freezing happens because of flow, velocity of flow, volume of flow, the type of gas moving, and whatever pressure drops are within the system. This is not Wikipedia knowledge, this is stuff I have first-hand experience with. I've dealt with cryogenic liquids and gases on many occasions. It doesn't matter what the gas is, any gas can freeze. How do you think an air conditioning system works? A liquid is forced through an orifice where there is a pressure drop and a phase transition. The same thing can happen with a gas but the transition is not as dramatic.

So what the fuck are we talking about? LOL It was stated that there are debates and articles saying that the cold weather is freezing wellheads thus causing delays
in gas delivery. I SAID IT WASN'T POSSIBLE. Done.

[svauto-erotic855]

So what the fuck are we talking about? LOL It was stated that there are debates and articles saying that the cold weather is freezing wellheads thus causing delays
in gas delivery. I SAID IT WASN'T POSSIBLE. Done.

The cold weather is causing gas systems to freeze up but not because of the cold weather. They're freezing up because of the high volume of gas passing through the systems for a sustained amount of time. On any system that deals with pressurized gas you have to make accommodations to deal with freezing. When there is water vapor in the primary gas freezing happens very easily because water has such a high freezing point when compared to the other gases flowing through the system. That is why drying systems are so critical in pneumatic systems like the ones used on a submarine. Just keep in mind that the people writing about this write newspaper articles and do not deal with mechanical things on a regular basis. The point I was trying to make is that well heads and any of the associated plumbing dealing with natural gas ( Or any gas) can and do freeze in the right conditions.

[Strychnine]

The bigger issue is frozen instrumentation. Shit in TX is not typically designed with heat traces or insulation for conditions like this.

pics from Entergy

[Strychnine]

Even nuclear went offline due to instrumentation issues. One of the two STP reactors in Matagorda County was taken down b/c of sensor problems

On Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, at 0537, an automatic reactor trip occurred at South Texas Project in Unit 1. The trip resulted from a loss of feedwater attributed to a cold weather-related failure of a pressure sensing lines to the feedwater pumps, causing a false signal, which in turn, caused the feedwater pump to trip. This event occurred in the secondary side of the plant (non-nuclear part of the unit). The reactor trip was a result of the feedwater pump trips. The primary side of the plant (nuclear side) is safe and secured.

https://atomicinsights.com/south-texas-project-unit-1-tripped-at-0537-on-feb-15-2021/

[Trip McNeely]

I'm surprised they still dont use heat trace or enclosed units with heat there. Because while the negative temps are rare they still get near freezing and below down there and the instrumentation down the line is susceptible. I guess they could always go manual everything lol. Where is that from, is that Permian?

GPU's and all process equipment up north is all enclosed, but the wellhead is completely exposed.

[Broncojohnny]

The cold weather is causing gas systems to freeze up but not because of the cold weather. They're freezing up because of the high volume of gas passing through the systems for a sustained amount of time. On any system that deals with pressurized gas you have to make accommodations to deal with freezing. When there is water vapor in the primary gas freezing happens very easily because water has such a high freezing point when compared to the other gases flowing through the system. That is why drying systems are so critical in pneumatic systems like the ones used on a submarine. Just keep in mind that the people writing about this write newspaper articles and do not deal with mechanical things on a regular basis. The point I was trying to make is that well heads and any of the associated plumbing dealing with natural gas ( Or any gas) can and do freeze in the right conditions.

You should have made this your first post and saved everyone the dance

[Strychnine]

Here's part of a study Black & Veatch did for ERCOT back in 2013 evaluating what could cause this exact situation:

pdf link: LONG-TERM ASSESSMENT OF NATURAL GAS INFRASTRUCTURE TO SERVE ELECTRIC GENERATION NEEDS WITHIN ERCOT: APPENDIX A
"Black & Veatch, at the request of ERCOT, has summarized in this Appendix, the factors that cause gas supply disruptions due to freezing weather"


Last paragraph:

In general, Gulf Coast fields (including Texas) do not routinely have freeze protection. With gas prices being low – and storage being full – the risk of 2-3 days of possible freeze-off every several years is a risk that Gulf Coast producers have been willing to take. It is a tradeoff between lost revenue from lost production vs. lost revenue from higher annual operating costs needed to freeze-protect individual wells.

As for the freezing:








Executive Summary pdf

[Trip McNeely]

Here's part of a study Black & Veatch did for ERCOT back in 2013 evaluating what could cause this exact situation:

pdf link: LONG-TERM ASSESSMENT OF NATURAL GAS INFRASTRUCTURE TO SERVE ELECTRIC GENERATION NEEDS WITHIN ERCOT: APPENDIX A
"Black & Veatch, at the request of ERCOT, has summarized in this Appendix, the factors that cause gas supply disruptions due to freezing weather"


Last paragraph:



As for the freezing:








Executive Summary pdf

Exactly, everything past the wellhead. And the only reason the tree valving would freeze is that due to not having ongoing cold weather I’m sure policy is to hydro test the valves with water, not 50/50 glycol water like they do up north.

[svauto-erotic855]

You should have made this your first post and saved everyone the dance

When I post things on here I do it with the thought that I'm talking to my peers who have the same basis of knowledge that I do. People here also have a habit of not reading my entire post and then thinking about what I'm trying to tell them. I basically did say the same thing in my first post but I had to further elaborate on it because people wanted to say I was mistaken in my beliefs.