Publications

Establishment of First Corrosion Testing Lab for Extreme Sour Conditions in Indonesia

Proceedings Title : Proc. Indon. Petrol. Assoc., 43rd Ann. Conv., 2019

Kedung Keris is an Oil and Gas Field located in Central-East Java with high levels of CO2 (42%) and H2S (1.2%), where well production fluids will be routed through a carbon steel pipeline to be processed further at Banyu Urip Central Processing Facility. Seamless carbon steel pipeline was carefully selected as the most economic option compare to other concept such as using Corrosion Resistant Alloy (CRA) pipeline and or having the production facility concept to separate and sweeten the sour multiphase fluid. For certain, thorough assessment has been performed prior to selecting this option and necessary mitigations are implemented. The high level of Hydrogen Sulfide (H2S) contained in Kedung Keris Field; crude oil, requires specialized testing to support material and chemical selection. The use of corrosion inhibitors for carbon steel pipelines is well established in the industry, with a number of industry standard tests currently being used for screening inhibitors. A rotating cylinder autoclave (RCA) test has been found to be the most reliable test for screening the effectiveness of corrosion inhibitors in multiphase flow. The strengths of this test are that it can replicate actual pipeline environments and wall shear stresses, and the equipment is flexible enough to be used for screening performance. Together with the Faculty of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, especially Material Science and Engineering Program Study, Bandung Institute of Technology, ExxonMobil developed a Corrosion Testing Program by establishing the first corrosion lab in Indonesia that can perform high pressure, high temperature Rotating Cage Autoclave (RCA) testing for sour service environment with > 1% H2S. The RCA was not procured as an as built package but was completely built in house by using Hastelloy solid material. This enables better understanding on how the equipment works in order to perform any necessary rectification and improvements to the RCA system in the future. This paper provides an overview of the Kedung Keris� RCA corrosion testing program and laboratory development, describing the testing process, the results and potential for further improvement. The testing program consisted of baseline corrosion testing, inhibited testing, oil partitioning testing and wettability testing. Results demonstrated that Kedung Keris� oil contains scale protection that provides self-inhibiting properties, which are key to selection and optimization of corrosion inhibitors. This initiative is part of ExxonMobil; commitment to build in-country capability, as well as maximizing local content for future needs on various chemical testing programs for sour service environment.

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