Patent Grant
7448692
The present invention is related generally to extracting bitumen from excavated oil sands and particularly to extracting the bitumen from the excavated oil sands in a shielded underground mining machine.
There are substantial deposits of oil sands in the world with particularly large deposits in Canada and Venezuela. For example, the Athabasca oil sands region of the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin contains an estimated 1.3 trillion barrels of potentially recoverable bitumen. There are lesser, but significant deposits, found in the U.S. and other countries. These oil sands contain a petroleum substance called bitumen (similar to an asphalt) or heavy oil (a highly viscous form of crude oil). Oil Sands deposits cannot be economically exploited by traditional oil well technology because the bitumen or heavy oil is too viscous to flow at natural reservoir temperatures.
Often the oil sands deposits may be tilted such that some of the resource will be found near the surface but much of the resource will occur at ever greater depths of burial. This is the case, for example, in the Athabasca oil sands of Alberta, Canada.
When oil sand deposits are at or near the surface, they can be economically recovered by surface mining methods. Recovery by surface mining is economical when there is, at most, a relatively thin layer of overburden that can be removed by large surface excavation machines. In current state-of-the-art oil sands surface mines, the exposed oil sands are excavated directly by large power shovels, transported by large haulage trucks to a conversion facility called a cyclofeeder. The ore is crushed and turned into a slurry in the cyclofeeder. From there, the slurry is hydrotransported to a large extraction facility where the bitumen is separated from the ore. The bitumen recovered from the extraction process is then transported to an upgrader facility where it is refined and converted into crude oil and other petroleum products.
The Canadian oil sands surface mining community is evaluating machines that can excavate material at an open face and process the excavated oil sands directly into a slurry. If such machines are successful, they could replace the shovels and trucks and cyclofeeder facility currently used, by producing an oil sands slurry at the working face which could then be sent via a hydrotransport system to a bitumen extraction facility.
In the large surface mining process described above, there is substantial disturbance of the surface. In Canada especially, the disturbed surface must be returned to its original condition after the recovery operations are complete. This requirement adds significantly to overall bitumen recovery costs. In the large surface mines, excavating the material and extracting the bitumen contribute significant emissions (principally carbon dioxide and methane) to the atmosphere.
When oil sand deposits are too far below the surface for economic recovery by surface mining, bitumen can be economically recovered in many areas by recently developed in-situ recovery methods such as SAGD (Steam Assisted Gravity Drain) or other variants of gravity drain technology which can mobilize the bitumen or heavy oil. The in-situ methods require a certain level of overburden for the process to be contained and also require deposits of a certain minimum thickness (typically greater than about 20 meters). The recovery factor of the in-situ methods can be degraded by the presence of intervening mud and shale layers within the deposits which can form barriers to the outward flow of steam and return flow of mobilized bitumen or heavy oil. Thus the economics of these processes are sensitive to the complex and variable natures of the reservoir geologies that are found. In the SAGD method, horizontal drilling technology is used to drill two closely spaced horizontal wells near the bottom of the ore deposits. These well pairs are used to inject steam into the formation above to heat and mobilize the bitumen. The heated bitumen then flows downward by gravity and is collected in one of the horizontal wells and pumped to the surface. The bitumen is then processed and sent to an upgrader facility.
SAGD requires enormous amounts of energy to generate steam to heat the underground deposits to the point where the bitumen can flow and be pumped. Typically, 20% to 30% of the energy recovered from a barrel of bitumen must be used to produce the steam required to recover the next barrel of bitumen in the SAGD process. The production of energy to produce steam also contributes significantly to greenhouse gas emissions.
Roughly 65% (approximately 845 billion barrels) or most of the deposits in the Athabasca cannot be recovered by either surface mining or in-situ technologies. There is a considerable portion of oil sands deposits that are in “no man's land”. These are areas where either (1) the overburden is too thick and/or there is too much water-laden muskeg for economical recovery by surface mining operations; (2) the oil sands deposits are too shallow for SAGD and other thermal in-situ recovery processes to be applied effectively; or (3) the oil sands deposits are too thin (typically less than 20 meters thick) for efficient use of surface mining or in-situ methods. This “no man's” land also includes significant deposits within the surface mineable areas that are under too much overburden, under swamps or under large tailings ponds. These “no man's” land deposits within the surface mineable areas are significant and contain tens of billions of barrels of economic grade bitumen. There is currently no viable means to recover the bitumen or heavy oil from these “no man's” land areas. Estimates for economical grade bitumen in these “no man's” land areas range from 30 to 100 billion barrels.
These “no man's” land deposits can be exploited by an appropriate underground mining technology. One such underground mining technique is the use of large soft-ground tunneling machines which are designed to backfill most of the tailings behind the advancing machine. This concept is described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/797,886, filed Mar. 5, 2002, and entitled “Method and System for Mining Hydrocarbon-Containing Materials”, which is incorporated herein by this reference, By this method, an ore slurry, such as produced by the cyclofeeder facility of a surface mine, or a bitumen froth, such as produced by a SAGD operation, can be outputted by the backfiling Tunnel Boring Machine or TBM, depending on whether any substantial ore processing is done inside the TBM. The material used for backfilling most of the volume excavated is provided by processed spoil or tailings from which the hydrocarbon or valuable ore has been extracted.
One embodiment of the mining method envisioned by U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/797,886 involves the combination of slurry TBM excavation techniques with hydrotransport haulage systems as developed by the oil sands surface mining industry. A TBM operated in slurry mode can be designed to produce an oil sands-slurry compatible with the density requirements of an oil sands hydrotransport system. Such a system appears to be capable of efficiently excavating oil sands, transporting the oil sand slurry to the surface for processing and then hydrotransporting a tailings slurry back to the advancing TBM for use as backfill material. TBMs may also be operated in non-slurry or dry mode. When operated in dry cutting mode, the TBM may still be a fully shielded machine with full isolation of the excavated material from the manned interior of the TBM and its trailing tunnel liner. In another embodiment of the mining method envisioned by U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/797,886, the bitumen may be separated inside the TBM or mining machine by any number of various extraction technologies.
The Athabasca oil sand is a dense interlocked skeleton of predominantly quartz sand grains with pore spaces occupied by bitumen, water, gas and minor amounts of clay. The sand grains are whetted by water and the bitumen does not directly contact the grains. The bitumen is a semi-solid hydrocarbon substance resembling asphalt. Because the bitumen is semi-solid and very viscous, it causes the oil sand to be relatively impermeable to the flow of free water and gas. Gas is present as discrete bubbles and also dissolved in both the bitumen and water.
For example, at 150 meters of overburden, it has been estimated that 0.3 to 0.6 cubic meters of gas is dissolved in a cubic meter of oil sand mined. This gas is typically composed of 80% methane and 20% carbon dioxide. When exposed to atmospheric pressure, the dissolved gas comes out of solution and can be released into the atmosphere, for example by surface mining. Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas which is estimated to be equivalent to 21 times its weight as-potent as carbon dioxide.
For the purposes of the present invention, the entities referred to variously as lumps, particles and matrices in the published art are referred to as granules, to distinguish them on one hand from sand grains or particles which they contain, and on the other hand from large lumps of oil sand as mined. Such granules include a nucleus of sand grains covered with a film of connate water, which may itself contain fine particles, encapsulated, often with gas inclusions, within a layer of the heavy oil known as bitumen, which is essentially solid at ground temperatures. The terms oil and bitumen are used interchangeably in this specification.
The process originally developed for releasing bitumen from oil sands was the Clark hot water process, based on the work of Dr. K. A. Clark, and discussed in a paper “Athabasca Mineable Oil Sands: The RTR/Gulf Extraction Process—Theoretical Model of Detachment” by Corti and Dente which is incorporated herein by reference.
Both the presently used commercial method and apparatus for the recovery of oil or bitumen from oil sands based on the Clark process, and the similar process and apparatus described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,946,597, use vigorous mechanical agitation of the oil sands with water and caustic alkali to disrupt the granules and form a slurry, after which the slurry is passed to a separation tank for the flotation of the bitumen from which the bitumen is skimmed. As proposed in the U.S. patent, the process may be operated at ambient temperatures, with a conditioning agent being added to the slurry. Earlier methods, such as the Clark process, used temperatures of 85° C. and above together with vigorous mechanical agitation and are highly energy inefficient. It is characteristic of both of the above processes that a great deal of mechanical energy is expended on physically disintegrating the oil sands structure and placing the resulting material in fluid suspension, this disintegration being followed by physical separation of the constituents of the suspension. Chemical adjuvants, particularly alkalis, are utilized to assist these processes. The separation process particularly is quite complex, as will be readily apparent from a study of U.S. Pat. No. 4,946,597, and certain phases have presented particularly intractable problems. Oil sands typically contain substantial but variable quantities of clay, and the very fine particles constituting this clay are dispersed during the process, limiting the degree to which the water utilized in the process can be recovered by flocculation of the clay particles. No economical means has been discovered of disposing of the flocculated and thickened clay particles, which form a sludge which must be stored in sludge ponds where it remains in a gel-like state indefinitely.
The Clark process has disadvantages, some of which are discussed in the introductory passage of U.S. Pat. No. 4,946,597 which is incorporated herein by reference, notably a requirement for a large net input of thermal and mechanical energy, complex procedures for separating the released oil, and the generation of large quantities of sludge requiring indefinite storage.
The Corti and Dente paper mentioned above suggests that better results should be obtained with a proper balance of mechanical action and heat application, and Canadian Patent No. 1,165,712, which is incorporated herein by reference, points out that more moderate mechanical action will reduce disaggregation of the clay content of the sands. Nevertheless, it continues to regard external mechanical action as playing an essential role in the disintegration of the oil and granules, which will inevitably result in partial dispersion of the clay. Thus, it proposes to use relatively more gentle agitation of the sand in a slowly rotating digester described in Canadian Patent No. 1,167,238 which is incorporated herein by reference. The digester in Canadian Patent No. 1,167,238 comprises in its broadest embodiment a shell, means for entry of liquids and solids into the shell at one end of the shell, a tubular outlet at the other end of the shell for discharge of liquids, a solids outlet at the same end as the liquids outlet, surrounding but separated from the liquids outlet, and a screw which surrounds the tubular liquids outlet to urge solids to and through the solids outlet, which screw is secured at its outer periphery to the shell. As seen in FIGS. 1, 2, 3 and 4 of Canadian Patent No. 1,167,238, the operating embodiment of the digester includes numerous plates and bars secured to the shell for moving the solids along the shell, and a set of bars for separating the clay from the oil sands. Slurry is introduced at one end of the shell. This slurry is a mixture of oil sands and hot water. The slurry is moved by the plates, bars and screw down the shell during which it is agitated and the oil and water gradually separated from the solids. At the other end of the shell, such oil and water, together with some fine material that has separated from the solids, is removed from one central, axial outlet, while the solids exit the digester at its base. This process, which is a concurrent process, still requires considerable post digestion treatment, as described in Canadian Patent No. 1,165,712 . The post digestion steps include further separation of the liquids into an oil rich component and a middlings component consisting primarily of water and fines, removing the fines from the middlings component by flocculation and centrifuging, and further treating the oil rich component for the removal of contained water, fines and solids. A detailed outline of the process is described with reference to FIG. 1 of Canadian Patent No. 1,165,712.
Separator cells, ablation drums, and huge interstage tanks are typical of apparatuses necessary in oil sands extraction. The one with perhaps the greatest potential is the Bitmin drum or Counter-Current De-Sander system or CCDS. Canadian Patent 2,124,199 provides a method of liberating and separating heavy oil or bitumen from oil sand in a counter current desanding apparatus known as a bitmin drum. The bitmin drum is a rotating vessel with various internal fins and pockets into which oil sand ore is fed at the upstream end and water is fed in at the downstream end. The outputs of the bitmin drum are a bitumen froth (bitumen, water and some sand and clay) slurry and a separate damp sand discharge.
Rather than seeking to find a balance of thermal and mechanical action to release the oil from the sand, Canadian Patent 2,124,199 relies mainly on thermal action alone to provide release or liberation of the bitumen. The presence of hot water acts as a medium both for heat transfer and for separation to occur. Mechanical action is used to ensure adequate contact between the water and the oil sand and its separated constituents so as to permit it to act effectively as both a heat transfer medium and a separation medium. The action of the bitmin drum is described in detail in Canadian Patent 2,124,199 and other references which are hereby incorporated by reference in the present invention.
The CCDS process is carried out in the bitmin drum, comprising submerging sand to be treated into a bath of hot water, gently rolling the sand within the bath. The resultant agitation of the water is sufficient to prevent liberated oil droplets from migrating to the surface of the bath, and the rolling of the sand is gentle enough to minimize substantial dispersion of any clay present. It is, however, sufficiently prolonged to permit substantial release and separation of oil coating from granules of the sand, removing sand from one end of the bath, and removing water, and oil from the other end of the bath. The sand and hot water are supplied at opposite ends of the bath to those at which they are removed. By passing the oil sand to be treated and the hot water in opposite directions through the bath, various advantages accrue. For example, separated oil froth passes with the water towards the opposite end of the bath from that at which the separated sand is removed, thus minimizing the risk of re-entrainment of oil on the sand as the latter is removed. The sand is exposed to the hottest water in the later stages of its treatment, thus favoring completion of liberation of the oil and the separation process. A settling zone maybe provided at the end of the bath from which the oil is removed, thus again favoring separation of the suspended solid particles from the water and oil before the latter leaves the bath.
An important objective of the CCDS process is to minimize the attrition of clay lumps in the oil sands with resultant suspension of clay solids in the treatment water. This is achieved by minimizng mechanical working of the oil sands during the release and separation process. The less clay is suspended, the easier is the treatment and recycling of the water used in the process, and the less clay sludge is produced requiring indefinite storage. An objective is to leave most of the clay essentially in its original state so that it may be returned, together with the separated sand, to the site from which the raw oil sands were extracted.
Other oil sands extraction methods include, but are not limited to, cyclo-separators in which centrifigal action is used to separate the low specific gravity materials (bitumen and water) from the higher specific gravity materials (sand, clays etc). The cyclo-separator has a number of major disadvantages including but not limited to (i) the need to comminute large rocks and remove contaminants, such as wood and tramp metal from input streams to avoid damaging the cyclo-separator; (ii) high rates of equipment wear and the concomittant need to use expensive abrasion resistant materials; (iii) de-aeration of the recovered bitumen which causes problems for downstream stages of separation; and (iv) cyclone failure or viscous plugging due to a black froth condition for high bitumen content ores. All studies to-date have led to the abandonment of the hydro-cyclone solution, even in very large fixed separation facilities.
The TCS process is a variant of the cyclone method, which involves three cyclones in a counter-current backwash configuration. The TSC circuit, as presently conceived, is a very large device because of the large front-end rougher separator cell which heads up that circuit.
Commercial surface mining operations in the oil sands require the excavation, haulage and processing of vast amounts of material. Once the bitumen has been extracted, the volume of tailings is actually greater than the original volume. This is because the bitumen originally resides in the pore space of interlocked sand grains. Even with the bitumen removed, the sand grains cannot be reconstituted into their original volume even under tremendous pressure. Thus, current surface mining methods result in a large and costly tailings disposal problem.
In a mining recovery operation, the most efficient way to process oil sands is therefore to excavate and process the ore as close to the excavation as possible. If this can be done using an underground mining technique, then the requirement to remove large tracts of overburden is eliminated. Further, the tailings can be placed directly back in the ground thereby eliminating a tailings disposal problem. The extraction process for removing the bitumen from the ore requires substantial energy. If a large portion of this energy can be utilized from the waste heat of the excavation process, then this results in less overall greenhouse emissions. In addition, if the ore is processed underground, methane liberated in the process can also be captured and not released as a greenhouse gas.
There is thus a need for a bitumen/heavy oil recovery method in oil sands that can be used to perform one or more of the following functions: (i) extend mining underground to substantially eliminate overburden removal costs; (ii) avoid the relatively uncontrollable separation of bitumen in hydrotransport systems; (iii) properly condition the oil sands for further processing underground, including crushing; (iv) separate most of the bitumen from the sands underground inside the excavating machine; (v) produce a bitumen slurry underground for hydrotransport to the surface; (vi) prepare waste material for direct backfill behind the mining machine so as to reduce the haulage of material and minimize the management of tailings and other waste materials; (vii) reduce the output of carbon dioxide and methane emissions released by the recovery of bitumen from the oil sands; and (viii) utilize as many of the existing and proven engineering and technical advances of the mining and civil excavation industries as possible.
These and other needs are addressed by the various embodiments and configurations of the present invention. The present invention is directed to hydrocarbon recovery in continuous excavation machines, such as a tunnel boring machine. As used herein, a “tunnel boring machine” refers to an underground excavating machine characterized by a rotating front end on which cutting tools are mounted and a cylindrical shield that forms the body of the machine. The rotating front end is connected to the shield, which does not rotate, by various shafts, rings and other structural members. As used in civil tunneling work, the machine moves through the ground that it excavates by propelling itself by gripping the walls of the excavation (hard rock TBMS) or by pushing off the tunnel liner being erected behind the machine (soft-ground TBMs). Multi-headed TBMs may be constructed by connecting one or more cylindrical TBMs.
In one embodiment, hydrocarbon-containing materials (e.g., oil sands) are conditioned and the hydrocarbon component (e.g., bitumen) in the materials separated as part of the action of excavating the oil sands by a shielded mining machine. The mining machine can include the following components:
The rotating part(s) of the vessel can be any vessel part the rotation of which agitates, preferably mechanically, the excavated materials-containing slurry contained in the vessel. For example, the part(s) can include one or more of a paddle, a blade, a raised surface of the cutter head, an outer or inner surface of the vessel, baffles, ridges or any other passive or active protrubances that assist in mechanically agitating the ore. The rotating part(s) can be part of the outer surfaces of the vessel or be separate therefrom. The part(s) of the enclosed vessel can rotate at substantially the same speed of the cutter head or at a speed different from the cutter head by means of a gear and clutch assembly. As will be appreciated, chemical adjuvants, such as alkalis, can be added to assist bitumen recovery.
The cutter head can be configured in a number of ways. For example, the cutter can include one or more jets for injecting (typically hot) water ahead of the cutter head and one or more mechanical cutting tools mounted on the front of the cutter head. Exemplary cutting tools include discs, drag bits, ripper teeth and combinations of these such as, for example, drag bits and water jets. Exemplary cutting tools also include any number of specialized cutter tools well-known to TBM tunnelers in the civil tunneling industry.
The vessel and cutter head can be in different operating modes. For example, the vessel and cutter head can rotate in one operational mode and the vessel can remain stationary while the cutter head rotates in another operational mode. The latter operational mode is made possible by a clutch assembly operable to operatively disengage the at least part of the enclosed vessel from the cutter head. In the latter operational mode, the slurried materials in the vessel are allowed to separate such that they can be removed from the slurry. Alternatively, the separation can be effected during part rotation by suitably configuring the vessel.
The final slurry can be pumped into any number of processing vessels to effect a significant degree of bitumen extraction. Processing vessels include, for example, abaltion drums, counter flow de sanding drums, hydrocyclone centrifuging systems and drums that can separate bitumen by the well-known Clark process.
Because the machine is typically located underground, the pressure inside the enclosed vessel is generally superatmospheric. For example, the pressure inside the enclosed vessel can be at or near a formation pressure within of an adjacent subsurface formation. By maintaining a superatmospheric pressure within the vessel, emissions of greenhouse gases can be reduced and some aspects of the bitumen extraction process can be enhanced. For example, gases associated with the bitumen particles can remain with the particles and help them float to the top for more efficient removal.
To permit the excavated material pass through the cutter head and into the vessel, the cutter head typically has one or more openings operable to pass the excavated hydrocarbon-containing materials through the cutter head and into the enclosed vessel. As is known to those skilled in civil tunneling, these openings can be sized to permit only the desired size of ore required by the particular processing method employed.
The enclosed vessel and its supporting systems can be configured to effect bitumen separation by any suitable technique, particularly by the Clark and/or CCDS techniques.
In another embodiment, a hydrocarbon extraction and excavation system is provided that includes the following components:
The CCDS drum be of any suitable configuration, such as a bitmin drum, or any other type of vessel in which the ore feed moves in the opposite direction through the vessel as the water used to agitate and heat the ore to cause the bitumen to separate. The drum typically includes a first outlet for a bitumen rich stream and a second output for waste material and wherein the tunnel boring machine comprises at least one discharge port positioned behind the machine to discharge at least most of the waste material outputted by the CCDS drum.
The machine can include a heat exchanger for heating water prior to input into the CCDS drum. The heat exchanger is in thermal communication with at least one thermal generating component of the tunnel boring machine.
The present invention can have a number of advantages. For example, compared to current surface mining techniques co-location of the tunnel boring machine and bitumen separation system, coupled with backfiling of waste material, can consume less energy and provide substantial cost savings through decreased material handling and decreased surface storage requirements for waste material. Energy consumption can be reduced substantially through the use of waste heat of the excavation process. The use of a funnel boring machine can cause minimal surface disturbance compared to surface mining techniques and permits excavation of hydrocarbon deposits in “no man's” land. Because openings in the cutter can be suitably sized, large rocks can be prohibited from entering into the vessel or drum until it is comminuted to a suitable size by the cutter head. Bitumen separation can be effected with low rates of de-aeration of the recovered bitumen, thereby avoiding problems in downstream stages of separation. Performing bitumen separation underground can permit methane and other greenhouse gases to be captured and not released into the atmosphere as greenhouse gases and avoid the relatively uncontrollable separation of bitumen in hydrotransport systems.
These and other advantages will be apparent from the disclosure of the invention(s) contained herein.
The above-described embodiments and configurations are neither complete nor exhaustive. As will be appreciated, other embodiments of the invention are possible utilizing, alone or in combination, one or more of the features set forth above or described in detail below.
a and b show, respectively, side and cross-sectional side views of a bitmin drum such as described in Canadian Patent 2,124,199;
a and b show, respectively, a cross-sectional view of the bitmin drum along line 9a-9a′ of
In one embodiment, the present invention includes a shielded mining machine that excavates oil sand material by using a combination of mechanical cutters, water jets and the action of a hot water slurry and a chamber for performing bitumen separation using a variation of the Clark process. The mechanical agitation of the hot slurry reduces the size of the clumps of oil sand and other material while the combination of mechanical agitation and hot water causes the bitumen to begin separating from the sand grains. When the material reaches a desired size, it is ingested through a rotating cutter head into a pressure chamber. The pressure chamber is formed by the rear of the rotating cutter head, an outer shield and a pressure bulkhead. Additional hot water and air may be added to the slurry in the pressure chamber. The material remains in the pressure chamber where it continues to be agitated by the rotation of the cutter head. The combination of hot water and mechanical agitation further reduces the size of the material and further separates the bitumen from the sand grains. After a selected residency time in the pressure chamber, the material is suitable to be pumped as a slurry from the pressure chamber to additional processing apparatuses in the mining machine. In an alternate embodiment, the cutter head rotation may be stopped allowing the heavier ore components (sand, clays etc) to settle and the lighter components (bitumen, gases, water) to rise to the top of the pressure chamber where a bitumen froth can be removed by any number of means known to those skilled in mine processing techniques. The present invention is a means whereby the nature of the well-known TBM slurry excavation process is configured to also accomplish: (1) excavation of the oil sands material; (2) desired comminution or size reduction of the material; (3) partial to complete separation of the ore (bitumen) from the waste material (sand); (4) preparation of the slurry to be compatible with a hydrotransport system or further processing inside the TBM; or (5) alternately removal of a substantial portion of the bitumen froth in the pressure chamber. Most or all of the energy to heat the water for the slurry is provided by waste heat from other systems of the mining machine. Throughout the processing, the excavated material is contained in a closed system so that gases such as methane contained in the bitumen can be utilized for floatation, controlled and eventually captured.
The mining machine used in the present invention is shown in
In the present invention, oil sands deposits are excavated by well-known slurry or Earth Pressure Balance (“EPB”) tunnel boring machine (“TBM”) methods or variations of these methods. These methods were primarily developed to control face stability in soft ground civil tunneling applications. In the present invention, the oil sands are excavated using slurry methods because (1) it is an efficient means of excavation in oil sands and (2) it is desired to convert the excavated material to a slurry for hydrotransport haulage away from the working face. The oil sands are excavated by forming a slurry of hot water mixed with excavated material outside the machine in front of the cutter head. The in-situ material is excavated by mechanical cutters and/or water jets that protrude through the slurry layer to contact the in-situ material. The grinding action of the slurry, as it is rotated by the cutter head, also contributes to the excavation of the in-situ material.
In the present embodiment of the invention, the oil sands may also be cut with a dense slurry (slurry density of in the range of approximately 1,600 kg/cu m to 1,750 kg/cu m which, in oil sands corresponds to approximately 67% to 77% solids by mass, or approximately 48% to 60% solids by volume).
In the present invention, it is envisioned that the mining machine will eventually operate in formation pressures as high as 20 bars. Currently, soft-ground machines can operate in formation pressures as high as 8 to 10 bars. The pressure range of the slurry in front of the of the cutter is preferably in the range of 1.1 bars to 20 bars, more preferably in the range 1.5 to 12 bars and most preferably in the range 1.5 to 8 bars, where 1 bar represents ambient atmospheric pressure.
The hot water may be provided by a water heating system in the machine; or by heat exchangers in the machine which utilize the waste heat from, for example, the TBM hydraulic cylinders and electric motors. This hot water may be injected under pressure into the slurry by one of several means, including by water jets. The slurry may also be heated by the mechanical action of the cutters on the cutter head and by the friction of the material against itself as it is rotated between the cutter head and the unexcavated material.
In current surface oil sands mining operations, the bitumen in oil sands is separated by a process commonly known as the Clark process, although other processes, using varying amounts of temperature, mechanical agitation and chemical additives, are being evaluated. The bitmin drum is an example of an alternate oil sands extraction technology.
Oil sand is a dense interlocked skeleton of predominantly quartz sand grains with pore spaces occupied by bitumen, water, gas and minor amounts of clay. The sand grains are whetted by water and the bitumen does not directly contact the grains. In the Clark process, the action of hot water, agitation-and some chemical additives causes the bitumen to separate from the sand grains by breaking the water bond between the bitumen and the quartz grain. Variants of the Clark process eliminate the need for chemical additives by increasing the heating or mechanical agitation or both and by increasing the residency time of processing. The action of the slurry or EPB excavation in front of the TBM cutter head using hot water can be considered a version of the Clark process and, thus, the act of excavating the ore also helps initiate the bitumen extraction and separation process.
The hot slurry in front of the cutter head causes the clumps of oil sand to break down (ablate) because of the combined action of hot water and grinding of the material against (1) itself, (2) the cutter tools on the cutter head, (3) the cutter head itself and (4) the unexcavated oil sand material. The oil sand material may also contain small rocks, cobble stones and boulders such as, for example, mudstone or shale. These will also tend to be broken up during the slurry excavation process. These rocks and rock fragments also help to grind the oil sand material. Thus, the slurry excavation process in front of the cutter head is acting simultaneously as a crushing and an autogenous milling process.
The temperature of the hot water in the slurry in front of the of the cutter is preferably in the range of 15° C. to 90° C., more preferably in the range 25° C. to 80° C. and most preferably in the range 35° C. to 65° C. The maximum typical dimension of the fragments resulting from the excavation process in front of the of the cutter is-preferably in the range of 0.02 to 0.5 meters, more preferably in the range of 0.05 to 0.3 meters and most preferably no greater than 0.02 to 0.1 meters.
The action of breaking the clumps of oil sand also tends to reduce the well-known abrasivity of the oil sand material. The heating of the bitumen tends to reduce the sticky nature of the oil sands and the bitumen.
The cutter head has various types of cutter tools mounted on its front face and contains the slurry entry openings (sometimes called muck buckets). These openings are sized to allow only certain size of material to pass through the cutter head into a pressure chamber behind the cutter head as shown, for example, in
The pressure chamber is a closed, pressurized vessel bounded by a shield on its periphery, the back of the rotating cutter head on one side and the front of a pressure bulkhead on the other side, as shown in
Once the slurry enters the pressure chamber behind the cutter head, additional hot water may be added. The back of the cutter head, the main bearing housing attached to the cutter head, the front of the pressure bulkhead (which remains stationary) and/or the interior of the shield may have baffles, impellers and paddles, for example, attached to their surfaces to enhance the agitation of the material as it is rotated in the pressure chamber by the action of the rotating cutter head. The material in the pressure chamber is further crushed and comminuted by the action of the material against itself and against the walls of the pressure chamber. The hot water furthers the separation of the bitumen from the sand grains by overcoming the water bonding forces between the bitumen and sand grains. The pressure chamber thus serves as vessel in which a version of the Clark process is continued on from that outside the cutter head. The pressure chamber also acts as a second autogenous mill and beneficiation facility since the material is further reduced in size and more bitumen is separated from sand grains.
An example of a machine with baffles attached to the back side of a rotating cutter head in the pressure chamber is shown in
As will be appreciated, the chamber may be configured as a drum operatively engaged with the cutting head, such that the entire drum rotates at the same speed as the cutter head. The drum may be defined by the cutter head as the front surface, the shield exterior of the TBM as the side surface, and a wall adjacent to and in front of the bulkhead as the rear surface. The drum may also be defined by the cutter head as the front surface, a wall separate from the shield exterior as the side surface, and a wall adjacent to and in front of the bulkhead as the rear surface. The drum may also be defined by a wall adjacent to and behind the cutter head as the front surface, the shield exterior or a wall separate from the shield exterior as the side surface, and a wall adjacent to and in front of the bulkhead as the rear surface. The drum when configured in the latter manner may be disengaged from the cutter head, such as by a clutch and gear arrangement, such that drum rotation can be stopped while the cutter head continues to rotate. The drum may also be connected to the cutter head or to one or more common motors shared with the cutter head via a gear assembly to provide a lower (using a step-down gear ratio) or higher (using a step-up gear ratio) rate of rotation than the cutter head. An example of an alternate embodiment in which the pressure chamber is mounted separately from the cutter head chamber is applied may be rotated separately is shown in
The pressure chamber may not be always full and may contain some air. Air may also be added to the slurry in the pressure chamber. Air can attach to the bitumen particles to promote development of a bitumen froth which acts to enhance the final separation of bitumen from the waste material.
The apparatus to excavate, comminute and separate ore from waste is envisioned as a fully shielded machine such as, for example, a tunnel boring machine (“TBM”). An example of such a machine is shown from two angles in
The excavating apparatus is formed by a rotating cutter head mounted at the front of a shield that comprises a shielded mining machine such as shown in
The front of the rotating cutter head is shown in
The cutter head is rotated by any number of means normally practiced in modern civil TBM tunneling machines. The cutter head is attached to a main bearing assembly which is a closed system for transferring the rotary power to the cutter head. The cutter head is sealed against the main body shield of the machine. The atmosphere in the manned portion of the inside of the machine is, in general, isolated from the pressure of the formation gases and fluids by a number of sealing methods commonly employed by civil TBM tunneling machines.
A pressure chamber is a closed chamber-located behind the cutter head and is formed by the shield on its periphery, the back of the rotating cutter head on one side and the front of a pressure bulkhead on the other side, as shown in
The length of the pressure chamber, expressed as a ratio of length of the pressure chamber to diameter, D, of the cutter head, is preferably in the range of 0.05 D to 2 D, more preferably in the range of 0.1 D to 1 D and most preferably in the range 0.1 D to 0.5 D. The rotational speed of the cutter head, expressed as a function of the diameter, D in meters, of the cutter head, is preferably in the range of 5/D rpm to 30/D rpm and most preferably in the range of 7/D rpm to 20/D. Typically, the rotational speed of the cutter head ranges from about 0.5 to about 5 rpm.
The rear of the pressure chamber is formed by a pressure bulkhead which is fixed to the main body shield as shown in
Any methane or carbon dioxide gases that form in the pressure chamber may be suctioned out of the pressure chamber by any of a number of well-known means such as referred to, for example, in paper reference 8 in the Appendix. If methane and other gases remain dissolved in the bitumen, they may be removed in a separate process when the bitumen slurry is delivered via hydrotransport means to bitumen processing apparatuses downstream of the pressure chamber.
When the slurry is broken down to the desired maximum size of material in the pressure chamber, it is passed through the pressure bulkhead via a hydrotransport (slurry) system using slurry pumps.
The resulting slurry is then suitable for either (1) hydrotransport out of the rear of the machine, down the trailing access tunnel, through the access tunnel portal to the surface; or (2) a short hydrotransport to a bitumen separating device within the machine. Because the material is highly fragmented and a substantial portion of the bitumen is separated from the sand, it may be processed by a hydrocyclone device such as shown in
a shows a front view of the left half of a typical slurry or EPB TBM cutter head 301. This view shows examples of cutter bits 302, auxiliary cutter bits 303 and water injection ports 304. Typically, the cutter head 301 may be rotated in either direction. The cutter bits 302 may be arrayed as shown in two orthogonal rows (as shown for example in
In one embodiment, the present invention includes a shielded mining machine that excavates oil sand material by using a combination of mechanical cutters, water jets and the action of a hot water slurry and a chamber for performing bitumen separation using the a Counter Flow DeSander Process or CCDS process. It is possible to put a counterflow desander device such, as for example, a bitmin drum inside a large TBM as a separate apparatus. Calculations show that an approximately 9-meter diameter by 20-meter long bitmin drum would be required to match the desired steady state production capacity of a 15-meter diameter TBM. This embodiment of the present invention integrates the two apparatuses, namely the TBM and the CCDS process, based on common components and requirements of both rotary drive systems.
To economially mine oil sands underground, a high production method should be employed. The preferred production rate should be in the range of 500 to 3,000 tonnes per hour. (A tonne of ore will yield approximately 0.5 to 0.7 barrels of bitumen per tonne of ore in the economic deposits of the Athabasca oil sands.) This range of production rates requires a large tunnel boring machine (in the range of 10 to 20 meters in diameter) and a large bitmin drum for extraction (in the range of 6 to 12 meters in diameter). A large tunnel boring machine will have a cutter head rotation speed in the range of 0.5 to 2 rpm. A bitmin drum capable of the required range of production will also have a drum rotation speed in the range of 0.5 to 2 rpm. Thus, in a preferred embodiment, the cutter head and bitmin drum can be rotated by separate drive systems utilizing common drive method and components. In another embodiment, both the cutter head and the bitmin drum can be rotated using a common drive system.
The cutter head of the tunnel boring machine will be required to stop for maintenance and also be required to reverse rotation direction to accomplish some steering, thrust and other functions. The rotation of the bitmin drum can be slowed and stopped but, in general, not at the same rate as the TBM cutter head. In addition, it is preferred that the bitmin drum always be rotated in the same direction if its internal fins and pockets are in a fixed position (this requirement can be eliminated if the internal components of the bitmin drum can be repositioned for opposite rotation with appropriate mechanisms). In general, the bitmin drum should be able to be independently rotated. The TBM cutter head and the bitmin drum can both start and stop operation without damaging effects on the ore or the ability to restart. This avoids the additional complexity of recirculating slurries and is another innovation of the present invention.
The cutter head of the TBM and the drum of the bitmin drum can, if desired, be rotated in opposite directions to improve substantially the rotational stability of the overall machine. For example, a 15-meter diameter TBM may have a cutter head whose rotating components weigh in the range of 500 to 800 tonnes. In operation, the slurry rotated by the cutter head may have a total mass in the range of 500 to 900 tonnes. The slurry does not all rotate at the same speed as the cutter head. A 9-meter diameter bitmin drum may have rotating components weighing in the range of 200 to 300 tonnes. In operation, the bitmin drum may contain in the range of 600 to 900 tonnes of ore. Thus, the angular momentum (measured about the axis of rotation of the cutter head and the bitmin drum, which are parallel with one another) of the cutter head and its rotating slurry is about the same as the angular momentum of the fully loaded bitmin drum. If the cutter head and bitmin drum are rotated in opposite directions, their angular momentums would tend to cancel out, substantially reducing the roll tendency of the overall machine.
The bitmin drum is known to function most-efficiently by ingesting dry or damp oil sands ore into its front end while warm water is injected into its back end to create the desired counter-flow de-sanding action. The approximate limits on the water content of the ore feed desired for a bitmin drum are: (i) a solids content greater than about 90% by weight which corresponds to greater than about 80% by volume and (ii) a slurry density greater than about 1,990 kg/m3.
If the ore feed to the bitmin drum contains additional water (typically a solids content below about 90% by weight), the bitmin drum desanding action may be substantially degraded or even rendered totally ineffective.
The TBM can cut the oil sands dry, damp or wet. Usually the choice, from the TBM standpoint, is made on the basis of face stability conditions. The oil sands represent a unique TBM cutting environment. The oil sands can be cut dry and will not release the dissolved gases (typically 80% methane and 20% carbon dioxide) if the cutting is done at local formation pressure. The oil sands may be cut with some water (damp) if this is appropriate from a tool wear and face stability standpoint, or if water is naturally present in the oil sands deposits. The oil sands may also be cut with a dense slurry (slurry density of approximately 1,750 kg/cu m or approximately 77% solids by mass, 60% solids by volume).
The TBM can be made to cut in any of the above modes and adjusted to deliver the most desirable feedstock to the bitmin drum. Further, the cutter head may be designed to remove a portion of the water from the excavated material so that the cutter head slurry is close to optimal for cutting purposes while the feedstock to the bitmin drum is close to optimal for extraction purposes. The ability to adjust the cutting slurry water content is also an important innovation of the present invention.
The maximum size of oil sands lumps, clay lumps or rock fragments is dictated by the ore feed opening into the bitmin drum. This sizing requirement can be met by controlling the size of openings (often called muck buckets) in the TBM cutter head. This feature is another advantage of combining a TBM with a bitmin drum since it eliminates the need for a separate crusher.
Preferably, in the proposed integrated system is that the excavated material be isolated from the manned portion of the TBM interior. The excavated material should also be able to be held at a desired pressure which is approximately at the local formation pressure. This requirement means that the interior of the bitmin drum should also be isolated from the manned portion of the TBM interior held at approximately the same pressure as the excavated material.
The formation pressures in which the TBM will operate are typically in the range of about 100 to about 1,000 kPa. It is not expected that these pressures will materially affect the performance of the bitmin drum as long as the pressure inside the bitmin drum remain at least substantially constant.
As noted previously, substantial methane and carbon dioxide are dissolved in in-situ bitumen at formation conditions. This dissolved gas is a significant greenhouse gas source if liberated into the atmosphere. This gas can, however, assist the extraction of bitumen from the oil sands if it remains: dissolved and attached to the bitumen particles. By operating a bitmin drum at formation pressure, the gases contained in the oil sands can be used to promote separation of the water and bitumen. This is because water and bitumen have densities that are very similar (both about 1,000 kg/m3) and the gases dissolved and attached to the bitumen particles lower its density and allow it to float to the surface as, for example, required by most of the separation processes practiced in the Athabasca oil sands industries. Further the gases can be captured during the separation process so that they can be prevented from escaping to the atmosphere and contributing to other emitted greenhouse gases. The ability to operate the bitmin drum in a closed and pressurized mode another advantage of the present invention.
a and b show a bitmin drum such as described in Canadian Patent 2,124,199. This is an example of a counterflow de sander apparatus 10. In
The bulkhead 1412 between the slurry chamber 1403 and the bitmin drum 1402 may also be a pressure bulkhead as is typically the case, for example, in a slurry TBM used in civil tunneling projects. This would allow the side 1408 to be de-pressurized, for example to perform maintenance on the bitmin drum.
A number of variations and modifications of the invention can be used. It would be possible to provide for some features of the invention without providing others.
For example in one alternative embodiment, the shielded machine can have two or more rotating cutter heads. In that machine configuration, the machine may include a separate bitumen separation chamber operatively engaged with each rotating head. The bitumen separation chambers can be based on the Clark and/or CCDS processes.
In another embodiment, during operation of a TBM, the cutter head may be intermittently stopped and started and is usually designed to operate at different rotation speeds and its rotation direction can be reversed.
In yet another alternate embodiment, the TBM cutter can be stopped and the mixture of components of bitumen, water, sand and clay can be allowed to settle according to their specific gravities. The bitumen with associated gases will rise to the top and can be skimmed off in the form of a lean bitumen froth in the pressure chamber of the present invention. The heavier sand and clays will settle to the bottom and can be removed in part by scavenging devices such as for example a screw auger. In another embodiment, it may be preferable to utilize more than one pressure chamber. The rotation of these pressure chambers may be accomplished by connecting them to the drive systems that are used to rotate the TBM cutter head or they may have their own drive systems. By feeding the slurry through successive chambers, the recovery factor of bitumen can be increased.
In yet a further alternative embodiment, it is preferable to utilize more than one pressure chamber. The rotation of these pressure chambers may be accomplished by connecting them to the drive systems that are used to rotate the TBM cutter head or they may have their own drive systems. By feeding the slurry through successive chambers, the recovery factor of bitumen can be increased.
The present invention, in various embodiments, includes components, methods, processes, systems and/or apparatus substantially as depicted and described herein, including various embodiments, subcombinations, and subsets thereof. Those of skill in the art will understand how to make and use the present invention after understanding the present disclosure. The present invention, in various embodiments, includes providing devices and processes in the absence of items not depicted and/or described herein or in various embodiments hereof, including in the absence of such items as may have been used in previous devices or processes, e.g., for improving performance, achieving ease and\or reducing cost of implementation.
The foregoing discussion of the invention has been presented for purposes of illustration and description. The foregoing is not intended to limit the invention to the form or forms disclosed herein. In the foregoing Detailed Description for example, various features of the invention are grouped together in one or more embodiments for the purpose of streamlining the disclosure. This method of disclosure is not to be interpreted as reflecting an intention that the claimed invention requires more features than are expressly recited in each claim Rather, as the following claims reflect, inventive aspects lie in less than all features of a single foregoing disclosed embodiment. Thus, the following claims are hereby incorporated into this Detailed Description, with each claim standing on its own as a separate preferred embodiment of the invention.
Moreover though the description of the invention has included description of one or more embodiments and certain variations and modifications, other variations and modifications are within the scope of the invention, e.g., as may be within the skill and knowledge of those in the art, after understanding the present disclosure. It is intended to obtain rights which include alternative embodiments to the extent permitted, including alternate, interchangeable and/or equivalent structures, functions, ranges or steps to those claimed, whether or not such alternate, interchangeable and/or equivalent structures, functions, ranges or steps are disclosed herein, and without intending to publicly dedicate any patentable subject matter.
The present invention is a divisional patent application of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/339,940 filed Jan. 9,2003 now U.S. Pat. No. 7,097,255, of the same title and inventors, which claims the benefits of U.S. Provisional Applications Ser. Nos. 60/347,348, filed Jan. 9, 2002, and 60/424,540, filed Nov. 6, 2002, each of which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.
| Number | Name | Date | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 604330 | Kibling | May 1898 | A |
| 3034773 | Legatski | May 1962 | A |
| 3678694 | Hapert | Jul 1972 | A |
| 3778107 | Haspert | Dec 1973 | A |
| 3784257 | Lauber et al. | Jan 1974 | A |
| 3888543 | Johns | Jun 1975 | A |
| 3941423 | Garte | Mar 1976 | A |
| 3960408 | Johns | Jun 1976 | A |
| 4055959 | Fritz | Nov 1977 | A |
| 4067616 | Smith et al. | Jan 1978 | A |
| 4072018 | Alvarez-Calderon | Feb 1978 | A |
| 4099388 | Hüsemann et al. | Jul 1978 | A |
| 4116487 | Yamazaki et al. | Sep 1978 | A |
| 4152027 | Fujimoto et al. | May 1979 | A |
| 4167290 | Yamazaki et al. | Sep 1979 | A |
| 4203626 | Hamburger | May 1980 | A |
| 4209268 | Fujiwara et al. | Jun 1980 | A |
| 4216999 | Hanson | Aug 1980 | A |
| 4440449 | Sweeney | Apr 1984 | A |
| 4445723 | McQuade | May 1984 | A |
| 4455216 | Angevine et al. | Jun 1984 | A |
| 4456305 | Yoshikawa | Jun 1984 | A |
| 4458947 | Hopley et al. | Jul 1984 | A |
| 4486050 | Snyder | Dec 1984 | A |
| 4494799 | Snyder | Jan 1985 | A |
| 4505516 | Shelton | Mar 1985 | A |
| 4603909 | Le Jeune | Aug 1986 | A |
| 4607889 | Hagimoto et al. | Aug 1986 | A |
| 4699709 | Peck | Oct 1987 | A |
| 4774470 | Takigawa et al. | Sep 1988 | A |
| 4793736 | Thompson et al. | Dec 1988 | A |
| 4808030 | Takegawa | Feb 1989 | A |
| 4856936 | Hentschel et al. | Aug 1989 | A |
| 4911578 | Babendererde | Mar 1990 | A |
| 4946597 | Sury | Aug 1990 | A |
| 5032039 | Hagimoto et al. | Jul 1991 | A |
| 5051033 | Grotenhofer | Sep 1991 | A |
| 5125719 | Snyder | Jun 1992 | A |
| 5141363 | Stephens | Aug 1992 | A |
| 5174683 | Grandori | Dec 1992 | A |
| 5205613 | Brown, Jr. | Apr 1993 | A |
| 5211510 | Kimura et al. | May 1993 | A |
| 5316664 | Gregoli et al. | May 1994 | A |
| 5330292 | Sakanishi et al. | Jul 1994 | A |
| 5534136 | Rosenbloom | Jul 1996 | A |
| 5534137 | Rosenbloom | Jul 1996 | A |
| 5697676 | Kashima et al. | Dec 1997 | A |
| 5831934 | Gill et al. | Nov 1998 | A |
| 5852262 | Gill et al. | Dec 1998 | A |
| 5879057 | Schwoebel et al. | Mar 1999 | A |
| 5890771 | Cass | Apr 1999 | A |
| 6003953 | Huang et al. | Dec 1999 | A |
| 6017095 | DiMillo | Jan 2000 | A |
| 6027175 | Seear et al. | Feb 2000 | A |
| 6206478 | Uehara et al. | Mar 2001 | B1 |
| 6554368 | Drake et al. | Apr 2003 | B2 |
| 20030038526 | Drake et al. | Feb 2003 | A1 |
| 20030160500 | Drake et al. | Aug 2003 | A1 |
| Number | Date | Country |
|---|---|---|
| 986146 | Mar 1976 | CA |
| 986544 | Mar 1976 | CA |
| 1165712 | Apr 1984 | CA |
| 1167238 | May 1984 | CA |
| 2124199 | Nov 1991 | CA |
| 2222668 | Nov 1997 | CA |
| 2315596 | May 2000 | CA |
| 2332207 | Jan 2001 | CA |
| 2358805 | Jan 2001 | CA |
| 0169042 | Sep 2001 | WO |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20050093361 A1 | May 2005 | US |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 60347348 | Jan 2002 | US | |
| 60424540 | Nov 2002 | US |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parent | 10339940 | Jan 2003 | US |
| Child | 11005759 | US |
