Power-Tube™: Success After Years of In-House Planning and Engineering at Petrospec

Power-Tube Installation in Canadian SAGD well

Petrospec is happy to report that their 2-well Power-Tube™ pilot project for SAGD has been successfully installed, and both wells are currently producing. The ESP’s for these wells were turned on in July.

“The installation and start-up of what are undoubtedly the world’s first coiled tubing deployed ESP’s in SAGD is a great accomplishment for Petrospec, and I’m proud to be a part of the team developing the Power-Tube™ product for this pilot,” shares Mark Padberg, senior technologist at Petrospec. Discussions at Petrospec around Power-Tube™ system designs date back to 2007.

Power-Tube™ is Petrospec’s coiled tubing deployment system for ESP’s, designed for use in areas where killing the well for pump change is difficult, or unwanted.

“Power-Tube™ makes it possible for operators to rapidly change a pump, resulting in lower service costs, reduced downtime of the well, and lower CO₂ emissions during well servicing,” shares Padberg. “These are advantages that only light-intervention equipment, practical installation methods, and safe work procedures like ours, can offer.”

“I think we might be the only company that can connect coiled tubing to an ESP in the horizontal position, then lift the system to vertical to run it into the well. The simplicity in our method, and the equipment we've designed to achieve this, is really quite novel,” adds Padberg.

This SAGD pilot project is a Power-Tube™ top hold down (THD) system where components of the ESP assembly are run as a pump insert style through-tubing completion.

With this system, all power, process, and sensor cables are packaged within a coiled tubing umbilical and connected to any third-party vendor ESP or ES-PCP for rapid live-well interventions. All Power-Tube™ configurations can be deployed under live well conditions, requiring no modification to third-party artificial lift equipment, and no dependency on rig availability.

Power-Tube™ is suitable for both conventional and thermal applications. Contact us today for more information.

About Petrospec Engineering

Established in 1997, Petrospec is proud to be a leading provider of turn-key reservoir monitoring systems for oil and gas operators. We strive to improve efficiency, meet high safety standards, and provide equipment and software for harsh environments. Our Edmonton-based company is a global innovator in downhole instrumentation, production optimization, and the accurate measurement of temperature, pressure, acoustics, and flow.