Publications

The pumping system is an integral part of pumping systems in the oil and gas industry. Pumping systems account for nearly 20% of the world’s energy used by electric motors and 25% to 50% of the total electrical energy usage in certain industrial facilities. Pump energy consumption is often one of the larger cost elements and may dominate the pump life cycle cost, especially if pumps run more than 2000 hours per year (Al-Khalifah and McMillan, 2012). Optimization of oil and gas production can be made through the better design and control of pumping systems. Most existing systems require flow control using bypass lines, throttling valves, or pump speed adjustment. To know which the best flow control is a literature review has been undertaken. Flow control by valve throttling wastes energy by diverting excess flow through a bypass or by restricting the pump discharge. Additionally, valves can be a source of emissions and suffer from corrosion, erosion, plugging, sticking, cavitations, and leakage. Meanwhile, installation of centrifugal pump using variable speed drive (VSD) can reduce energy lost, improve process control, and improve system reliability and capital cost savings. With centrifugal pump installations, savings of between 30% and 50% have been achieved in many installations by installing VSD (Hydraulic Institute, 2004). This is a good opportunity for the oil and gas sector. Although VSD has many benefits, it is still not a perfect control method, because it has some potential drawbacks, for example, structural resonance, electrical, and safety issues. There is a need for engineers to apply the best design and application to ensure the total system design and implementation in oil and gas production will not result in drawbacks.