Blake Whittington, OXY USA Inc.
Rod pumps are not the ideal system of lift when it comes to handling gas. We can only do so much with the configuration downhole especially for wells with open hole completions. Despite the limited options, we are coming to find that we can do better by manipulating parameters at the surface. Historically, we have manipulated back pressure on the tubing in order to control when gas breaks out of solution in the tubing. Now we are finding, on certain well types, that manipulating back pressure on the casing in order to keep gas in solution through the pump is proving to be successful. By doing this, we are seeing beam wells that now face less equipment stress due to gas interference, more consistent, stable run time and production on a daily basis, and even optimized inflow where production increases for wells.