A Review of Cold Production in Heavy Oil Reservoirs

The cold production process, in which sand and oil are produced simultaneously under primary conditions, has been economically successful in several unconsolidated heavy oil fields in Alberta and Saskatchewan, Canada. This review will first describe the field studies that have been performed by oil producers to understand the mechanisme involved in cold production including: tracer tests, gamma ray tests. The laboratory studies performed by different research organizations, including ARC, on the mechanisms involved in cold production: foamy oil drive, geo-mechanics, sand erosion, sand transport will be reviewed.