Gazprom-AR2014

88
Innovations
— produced a technology to ensure stable operation of wells at low reservoir and wellhead
pressures and with their products containing reservoir fluid, based on distributed compression
using modular compression units placed at gas well clusters. This technology has increased
the period of economically viable life of fields with declining reservoir pressure; and
— developed an alternating water and gas injection technology to retrieve condensate from low
pressure reservoirs and oil from oil rims of gas condensate fields using pump ejector systems.
The technology was successfully used to boost the output of hydrocarbons.
Gas transportation and underground storage
To ensure highly reliable and smooth gas supplies Gazprom is continuously improving its gas
transportation technologies and equipment. It continues enhancing own system for managing the
operability and integrity of gas pipelines, designing advanced diagnostics and repair tools, as well
as energy efficient equipment and gas compression technologies.
In 2014, Gazprom completed the development of smart inline inspection pigs using the electromagnetic
acoustics (EMA) method. The inspection pig features a novel solution that uses wheel
motor-generators that allow adjusting its speed within a given range (regardless of the gas flow
speed and the gas pipeline’s angle of incidence) and feeding electricity to energy-consuming
EMA-converters. The advantages of this solution include the ability to run inspections in any operating
conditions of the gas pipeline, at higher-than-usual rates of defect detection in pipe
metal. The solution also enables highly accurate assessment of defect parameters.
Gazprom is implementing a project of a simple-cycle gas turbine drive with a unit capacity of
32 MW and net efficiency of 39% to 40% for natural gas transportation. Apart from high energy
efficiency, the resulting gas turbine facility will have a low weight and a comparatively lower life
cycle cost as compared to existing peers.
The Company continues research into the use of hydrogen enriched syngas produced through
thermal conversion from natural gas as an additive to fuel gas. The research results are to be used
to reduce fuel consumption and exhaust gas toxicity in gas turbine drives of gas pumping units as
part of compressor stations upgrade projects and for new-type gas turbine units featuring exhaust
energy recovery modules.
Hydrocarbon processing and gas- and petro-chemistry products
Gazprom has designed a membrane helium separation technology for sustainable development
of helium-rich resources of Eastern Siberian and Far East fields.
The technology will be used to develop the Chayandinskoye oil and gas condensate field to
separate helium concentrate from natural gas and ensure its long-term storage in the productive
reservoir.
A new membrane cryogenic energy efficient natural gas processing technology was developed
for the Orenburg helium plant to produce commercial helium, ethane and NGL.
The application of the membrane-based cryogenic technology instead of the conventional
cryogenic technology will reduce energy consumption by 60%, capex by 50%, and operating
costs by 12%.
OAO Gazprom Annual Report 2014