Sand particle retention in slurry flow using CFD-DEM approach

Excessive sand production is a challenge in the oil-and-gas industry. Installation of a mechanical sand screen is a conventional method to reduce sand production at source. Our work investigates the efficiency of sand retention process of a wire-wrap screen via coupled Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) and Discrete Element Method (DEM) approach. The sedimentation of a dilute concentration of poly-dispersed particles are simulated. We find good agreement between the predicted sand productions through a sand screen with experimental data from literature. We further investigate the effect of screen inclination on sand screen efficiency. It is observed that for inclination less than 30°, sand production through the re-wrap screen is relatively unaffected. When particle adhesion is introduced, a reduction in sand production as a solid pack of particle agglomerate is formed over the sand screen. The formation of a stable sand pack allows the sand production to cease. However, when the inclination exceeds 30°, the sand pack is unstable, and continuous sand production is observed. These findings demonstrate the use of CFD-DEM for sand screen selection and design as an alternative to physical experiments.