Essential Expertise for SAGD Operations - Nalco

Essential Expertise
for Water, Energy and Air SM
Image reprinted with permission of TIW WESTERN Inc.
Essential Expertise for
SAGD Operations

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Maximizing production from extraction
through refining
SAGD operators are continuously challenged with optimizing their
operations to reach production target rates and profitability. Specifically,
managing the energy requirements associated with steam production
and water quality issues requires a partner with essential expertise in
water treatment as well as oil production, upgrading and refining.
Nalco has been involved with heavy oil production and refining for over 40
years. We understand the critical issues facing today’s oil, gas and bitumen
producers throughout the entire life cycle of a project. From CAPEX design
to OPEX implementation we work to deliver programs that will maximize
customer profitability.
As the world leader in water treatment, Nalco’s highly trained, technical
experts work alongside customers to solve the unique problems inherent
in steam assisted gravity drainage (SAGD) operations. Given the
continuous treatment required for the reuse/recycle of the water needed
for steam generation, expertise in water management is critical. Nalco’s
technology and services include anti-scaling chemicals, corrosion inhibitors,
anti-fouling products, coagulants and flocculants. Our onsite experts
are experienced in optimizing water processes to ensure sustainable
facility operations.
Our next generation heavy oil emulsion breaker technologies effectively
separate oil from water reducing the amount of off-spec slop oil and
increasing the amount of oil production. Given the increasing global
demands for energy over the next 20 years, oil sands producers need
technologies that minimize the loss of hydrocarbon during processing while
protecting our natural resources.

Customer-driven Innovation
Our field experts work closely with researchers dedicated to the issues
unique to SAGD operations. These highly trained researchers spend up to
50% of their time in the field to better understand the challenges faced by
SAGD operators. This “research connectivity” to real world heavy oil
applications is critical to our success. As a result, our technologies are
tailored to our customers’ unique needs. In fact, we pre-screen our new
chemistries for performance in both full-scale and pilot testing facilities in
order to replicate operating conditions and make adjustments before new
products are introduced into an operational setting.
Nalco has over 500 researchers, 40% of whom are PhDs. We hold over
2,000 patents and are known for a vitality index (percent of products
developed in the last five years) that exceeds 40% in new oil production
and refining technologies.
Combining this research commitment with our industry knowledge and
onsite expertise from the oilfield to the refinery gives you a unique
problem-solving partner focused on providing a significant return on
investment (ROI).
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A unique process implemented by
highly trained people… Nalco’s Total
System Analysis
Nalco’s Total System Analysis (TSA) is a unique and comprehensive
assessment of chemical programs at customer locations that drives
significant improvements in technical services, benchmarking and
reporting processes, environmental sustainability and customer
profitability.
The advantages of performing a TSA include:
• Opens communication with all stakeholders (operations to management)
in order to understand and review key cost drivers/problem areas
• Bridges gaps from the “As Is” current business process in order to meet the
“To Be” desired business process
• Prioritizes and defines work scope on projects with customer agreement in
order to drive results
• Drives technical problem solving and R&D focus to agreed upon projects
• Defines processes/meetings required to maintain road map to reducing
Total Cost of Operation (TCO) and driving continuous improvement
• Maximizes production, enabling operators to meet or exceed
production targets
Proven impact on profits
Operators of SAGD production facilities have used the TSA program
to improve their processes through innovative emulsion breaker/reverse
emulsion breaker (EB/REB) formulations and modified injection points that
have resulted in better oil/water separations, lower chemical treating rates,
improved system reliability and reductions of chemical inventory requirements.
The implementation of a TSA approach to a SAGD facility could generate
annual net savings in the range of $100K to millions of dollars annually while
minimizing the occurrence of system upsets.

The TSA Process
STAGE ONE
NALCO HEALTH CHECK AUDIT
1
Identify audit
team and
perform site
review
NALCO
6
Review System
Survey, finalize
root cause findings
& develop
corrective action
recommendations
NALCO
2 Conduct technical
Perform field
and
engineering
interviews
NALCO
& Producer
7
Prioritize recommendations
using
risk assessment
matrix & identify
improvement
opportunities
NALCO
& Customer
3
System Survey
and Perform
lab analysis
NALCO
& Operations
8
Present TSA
including
opportunity
assessment &
base chemical
program
NALCO
Identify Any:
• Performance gaps
• Potential root causes
• Plans for corrective action
• Shared learning
opportunities
NALCO
& Operations Engineer
CORRECTIVE ACTION ASSESSMENT & PRIORITIZATION
STAGE TWO
4
9
Short / Medium
Term Action plan
NALCO with
Customer Input
5
Initial feedback
summary
to customer
NALCO
& Customer
10
Technology
Deployment
Plan
NALCO with
Customer Input
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BREAXIT
Emulsion
Breakers
Free Water
Knockout
Nalco’s experience and technologies
help our customers from the field to
the refinery. There’s no need to deal
with multiple suppliers when you can
work with one company committed to
optimizing your SAGD operation.
Refinery Chemistries
Upgrader Chemistries
Separators
BREAXIT Reverse
Emulsion Breakers
OTSG
3D TRASAR ®
Boiler Technology

Skim Tank
Warm Lime
Softener
NexGuard
Scale Dispersants
NALCOLYTE ®
Water Clarifiers
SAC/WAC
MONITOR
Fouling Control
Water Pond
Water
Storage
Water
Steam
Emulsion
Crude
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Unique Nalco technologies deliver sustainable efficiencies
and drive higher profits
Emulsion breakers
Nalco is continuously developing new emulsion breakers
for production enhancement, including BREAXIT for down
hole viscosity reduction and heavy crude specific to SAGD
recovery processes. Our emulsion breakers offer the
following benefits:
• Rapid, sharp separation
• No heavy metals or organic halides added
• Versatility in treating all types of emulsions
• Industry leading injection dosages
• Convenient to handle, easily dispersed
• All of which lead to improved production reliability
and decreased operating costs
The emulsion breaker evaluation process is implemented in
five stages to ensure that the optimum chemical formulation
is applied to your system. Our Nalco field engineers conduct
a thorough review of the system to identify the proper sets of
conditions to be used for designing the bottle test method.
Emulsion breaker candidates are evaluated onsite using
produced fluids in bottle test experiments that help identify
the appropriate chemistry for each specific system. Once
the optimum process and best emulsion breaker candidate
is identified, a final recommendation is presented to the
operator for review and cost-performance optimization
opportunities. Then, the new emulsion breakers and
processes are field tested in the system to demonstrate
performance and optimize chemical dosages. Periodic
system evaluations are conducted to continuously optimize
the dose rates and reduce TCO for our customers.
Heavy oil production by SAGD presents many challenges,
but oil and water separation is among the most critical
within the industry. Since the incoming crude normally
carries significant concentration of bitumen and other
surface-active species, unique chemical and mechanical
treatment methods are required to generate saleable crude
and reclaimable produced water.
Emulsion Breaker Evaluation Process
Nalco offers a unique line of emulsion breakers that are
specifically designed to resolve difficult crude oil emulsions
produced during SAGD operations. Our chemicals produce
excellent separation with substantially anhydrous crude
petroleum at minimum cost to the customer. Another
important benefit of Nalco’s EB technology is that, combined
with our best practices for slop oil management, it can reduce
or eliminate slop oil — off-spec oil insufficiently separated
from the production stream’s basic sediments and water
during processing.
Nalco’s BREAXIT emulsion breaker technology provides a
step change performance enhancement that potentially saves
millions of dollars per year in reduced process upsets, treatment
cost and disposal of off-spec oil as well as maximized
re-use of produced water in the steam generation cycle.

Produced Water Clarification
It is imperative for SAGD operators to clean and clarify their produced water
to make it suitable for steam generation. The produced water arrives in the
form of water-in-oil emulsions and/or oil-in-water reverse emulsions from the
production wells. After the oil is separated, the remaining water has to be
treated with water clarification chemicals to remove organic and inorganic
impurities before it can be recycled back as steam.
Nalco water clarification programs are designed to enhance removal of total
suspended solids (TSS), color and total organic content (TOC), minimize
sludge volume, help with environmental compliance and improve the use of
existing mechanical treatment methods with chemical precipitation. We also
ensure that our water clarification chemicals are thermally stable to withstand
the high fluid temperatures associated with SAGD operations. Our field
engineers continuously monitor the water clarification program to ensure
it is operating at optimum conditions.
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Fouling Control
Organic and inorganic fouling can be one of the main drivers for operating
problems and lost profits. The efficient operation of the refinery and upgrading
process can be quickly degraded by fouling leading to fluid flow restriction,
reduced heat transfer rates, shorter asset life and compromised product quality.
While fouling can be found throughout the refinery and upgrading facilities, the
most common problem areas include:
• Heat exchanger trains, furnaces and heaters, atmospheric and vacuum towers
• Hydrotreater or hydrodesulfurization (HDS) unit and hydrocracker:
feed/effluent heat exchangers and reactor beds
• Fluid catalytic cracking unit (FCCU): slurry exchangers and steam generators
• Purification train: reboilers and towers
• Compressors
• Coker furnaces
• Once-through steam generators (OTSG)
Fouling deposits can consist of inorganic materials like iron sulfide corrosion
by-products, and organic materials such as agglomerated asphaltenes, thermally
degraded polymer, and coke. Deposits often contain a complex mixture of organic
and inorganic materials.
Nalco is continuously working with SAGD operators to introduce new technology
that reduces or eliminates deposition in a cost effective manner. For example, we
have recently developed novel silica dispersant chemistries that eliminate the
deposition of silica scales inside the OTSG, and are also effective for evaporators
used to generate boiler feed water from produced water. This anti-scale program
virtually eliminates deposition over a wide range of feed water silica concentrations.
Utilizing the proper anti-scale system, in combination with Nalco’s field expertise,
prevents costly repairs to your OTSG and loss of revenue due to production upsets.
Another example of Nalco innovation is NexGuard ® technology. It outperforms
precipitating phosphate programs by keeping most impurities soluble, reducing
the amount of blowdown and the potential for deposits. This technology also out-
performs chelant programs by ensuring significantly lower corrosivity. Additionally,
it demonstrates superiority over all-polymer treatments by effectively handling
hardness upsets, resisting degradation in the presence of oxygen, and remains
extremely effective during high heat flux and long retention time applications.
Automation
Nalco’s business began with treating boiler systems; we’ve worked with thousands
of boiler plants for over 80 years. For SAGD operations, Nalco has now pushed far
beyond traditional performance boundaries to help our customers produce safe,
reliable and cost-effective steam.
Fouling of heat exchangers can have significant impact on the operator’s bottom line
profitability. The MONITOR ® software is a program specifically designed to analyze
fouling trends on heat exchanger networks. This program identifies the source of
fouling and points to the correct remedial actions by using rigorous thermodynamics,
industry standard heat transfer correlations and time-line trend analysis. Using the
MONITOR program is the first step toward improving energy management and
reducing your total cost of operation.
Our state-of-the-art 3D TRASAR ® Boiler Technology automatically detects system
variability, then determines and executes the appropriate response before problems
occur, and delivers measurable results in the form of reduced water, energy and
carbon emissions. Your Nalco sales engineer will establish boiler-specific best
practices for pre-boiler corrosion control as well as boiler scale and deposit control.

Our Mission
Essential Expertise for Water, Energy and Air SM describes
both the vital role we play for our customers, and our shared
commitment to sustainable development. Our industry
knowledge, onsite service, and customer-driven innovation
in a variety of industries is the essential expertise we bring to
customers that results in cleaner water, less industrial use of
fresh water, energy savings and improved air quality - all while
helping our customers save money and be more successful.
Our Commitment in Canada
Our commitment to the Canadian oil sands industry is
demonstrated not only by the teams we have in place across
Canada’s oil fields, but our investment in domestic manufacturing.
Nisku, Alberta is home to our Canadian manufacturing
facility. Currently undergoing expansion, our $27 million
(Canadian) facility will provide a significant portion of the
chemistries used in Canadian SAGD operations by 2012.
Reliable supply. Reliable expertise. Local presence. Nalco is
the one and only water and process expert you’ll ever need.
Nalco Responsible Care
Our Safety, Health and Environment programs are structured
on Responsible Care ® , a voluntary, global initiative for the
chemical industry. Responsible Care has been part of our
culture since we helped establish the program in 1985.
Responsible Care is implemented through a management
system approach that offers an integrated, structured methodology.
It incorporates seven Codes of Management Practices
that outline specific areas to focus our continuous
improvement efforts:
• Community Awareness and Emergency Response
• Pollution Prevention
• Process Safety
• Distribution
• Employee Health and Safety
• Product Stewardship
• Security
Implementing Responsible Care includes mandatory, inde-
pendent third-party verification of those management systems.
To help ensure we have proper SH&E systems in place to
operate our manufacturing plants, we are in the process of
certifying all our facilities worldwide to either ISO 14001 or RC
14001. Both are globally recognized management systems
designed to protect the environment and continually improve
environmental, health, safety and security performance.
Currently, 41 of our 49 plants worldwide have been certified
to these standards through rigorous, third-party evaluations of
their operations.
Sustainability
Nalco’s technologies help our customers achieve sustainable
development goals by reducing water and energy consumption
while enabling them to operate more cost effectively. We have
more than 11,000 employees working with more than 70,000
customers in 130 countries in industry, government and
institutions to reduce water and energy consumption by solving
and preventing problems, protecting the environment, decreasing
costs, increasing productivity, improving profitability by
reducing our customers’ total cost of operation and maintaining
asset integrity.
Nalco works to meet its customers’ needs through our
commitment to identifying, nurturing, protecting and delivering
new technologies. Through global research groups, Nalco
develops key ideas, advancing them rapidly and efficiently
through our product development process. We apply advanced
scientific principles and techniques to develop practical solutions
to complex challenges in a wide variety of industries and
applications. We stand ready to address yours.
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Nalco’s Commitment to Sustainability
Nalco Company is the world’s leading environmental solutions
provider. We create value for customers and Nalco through services
and technologies that save water and energy, enhance production
and improve air quality, all while reducing total costs of operation.
Helping Customers Operate Sustainably
Nalco treats a significant proportion of the world’s industrial and
process water, and has done so since its founding more than
eighty years ago. Our sales, service, research and marketing team
of more than 7,000 technically trained professionals serves more
than 70,000 customer locations in 130 countries. Our expertise
in water and energy helps our customers efficiently use both
resources, saving them money while improving the environment.
Look across our portfolio for the upstream and downstream
sectors of the energy services industry and you will find that many
of our offerings provide tangible environmental and economic
benefits. From oil fields to refineries, we directly impact our
customers’ profitability by reducing greenhouse gases through
energy efficiency improvements and by reducing solid waste
generation and exposure to hazardous materials.
Nalco programs create significant economic value for customers.
The environmental return on investment (eROI SM ) we provide
includes savings from reducing water and energy use, conserving
assets, reducing solid waste disposal, and improving utilization
of other natural resources and raw materials.
The Sustainability and Security of
Nalco’s Operations
In today’s world there are increasingly powerful expectations of
individuals, society, governments, and industries concerning the
current and future management of their activities. Making a
commitment to sustainable development is absolutely the right
thing to do. For many years Nalco has included key principles of
Essential Expertise
for Water, Energy and Air SM
sustainable development within our corporate policy statements
and commitments, in particular within our corporate Safety, Health,
Environment and Sustainability Principles. These commitments
apply to our internal operations as much as they do to helping
our customers meet their own sustainability goals, aggressively
managing our own environmental footprint. As a good corporate
citizen, Nalco also has a long-standing commitment to ensuring
the security of its sites and employees. Regular audits and
assessments are used to evaluate Nalco facilities worldwide to
prevent harm to individuals, employees and the community.
Our performance is disclosed in our annual Safety, Health,
Environment and Sustainability Report, including:
Waste Reduction: Since 2004 the total amount of waste generated
by Nalco’s manufacturing operations worldwide has been cut by
15%, while our production increased 15.2%.
Energy Reductions and Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Emissions:
Nalco is committed to a 10 percent reduction in energy use from
2007 levels by 2012. Because of the direct relationship between
energy use and GHG, this will mean a percentage reduction in
GHG emissions in the high single-digits over the same period.
As part of our commitment to continuously improving our environmental
performance, our manufacturing plants around the world
are undergoing a comprehensive program of accreditation to
either ISO14001 or Responsible Care ® 14001, the global standards
for environmental performance.
We can always improve, which is why we continuously strive to do
better – for our employees, our communities and our customers.
NALCO COMPANY OPERATIONS
North America: Headquarters – 1601 West Diehl Road • Naperville, Illinois 60563 • USA
Energy Services Division – 7705 Highway 90-A • Sugar Land, Texas 77478 • USA
Europe: Ir.G.Tjaimaweg I • 2342 BV Oegstgeest • The Netherlands
Asia Pacific: 2 International Business Park • #02-20 The Strategy Tower 2 • Singapore 609930
Latin America: Av. das Nações Unidas 17.891 • 6˚ Andar 04795-100 • São Paulo • SP • Brazil
www.nalco.com
Nalco, the logo and the tagline, 3D TRASAR, BREAXIT, MONITOR, NexGuard, NALCOLYTE
and Total System Analysis are trademarks of Nalco Company.
All other trademarks and logos are the property of their respective owners.
© 2010 Nalco Company, all rights reserved. Printed in U.S.A. 2/10 Bulletin 1064