Metering Water Use

Metering water use in a steam-assisted gravity drainage facility is very complicated because of how water is circulated and reused in the process. It requires many water meters and several different formulas to obtain an accurate measure of our freshwater and produced water use. Accurate measured volumes are important because this data is used in the recycle rate calculation.

Since start-up of Surmont Phase 1, we identified areas for improving our water metering process and have taken steps to increase our accuracy. We installed a single meter to measure the total steam volume leaving the facility to improve our metering accuracy. Our previous calculation process involved using data from 27 different meters to get this same information. This improved measurement accuracy allows us to focus our efforts on exploring alternative solutions to minimize our use of freshwater.

Surmont Phase 1 began reporting the water recycling rate on a monthly basis in June 2009 at the Energy Resources Conservation Board’s request.

Our Water Performance

Water metrics for Surmont Phase 1

Absolute total water use at Surmont increases as production increases. We expect Surmont to handle between 2.5 and 3.0 barrels of water per barrel of oil produced throughout its 40-year life. About 90 percent of this water will be recycled and reused, with a net water use of 0.6 barrels of water per barrel of oil.

As Surmont reaches peak production, we expect water use per barrel to decrease as the process efficiencies are developed and implemented over time.

Advancing Technology to Minimize Water Use

We continually investigate available technology and fund emerging technologies in order to use less water in our oil sands projects. The key challenge in applying new technology or using lower-quality (e.g. increased salinity or hardness) inlet water is achieving balance between incremental improvements in water use against excessively higher energy, infrastructure, water/chemical transport, chemical use or wastewater disposal costs (e.g. increased greenhouse gas emissions due to more intensive water treatment or chemical transport costs).

For more information on various water sources and their associated costs, click here.

The technologies we assess include:

• Reducing steam-oil ratio (SOR). We are working to reduce our steam-oil ratio to decrease the amount of steam it takes to produce a barrel of oil. By doing so, we will burn less gas and use less water. We are exploring the practical benefits of injecting lighter hydrocarbons with the steam. This may reduce the viscosity of the oil in the reservoir and require less steam – and water – to produce the oil.
• Applying new well configurations. We are evaluating new well configurations to increase recovery efficiency. One of these configurations, called “cross steam-assisted gravity drainage,” involves drilling the horizontal wells in a checkerboard pattern.
• Recovering water from waste streams. We are assessing the use of centrifuges to recover additional water from a waste stream of lime sludge – a byproduct of the water treatment process that typically dewaters through gravity drainage prior to landfill disposal. Recovering additional water through the use of centrifuges will both improve the Surmont water recycle rate and reduce the volume of material sent for disposal.