TAGS: Polymer Reinforcement
As is well known in the oil industry, one of the most common reasons for drilling tools breaking down is failure of rubber polymer. A leading producer of oil industry equipment in China has found that graphene nanotubes improve abrasion resistance of the rubber stator by 20% and increase tensile modulus by 30%, resulting in a shortened drilling cycle, reduced energy consumption and less environmental pollution from the drilling equipment.
Avoiding Drilling Tool Failures
56% of drilling tool failures in the oil extraction industry are caused by low durability of the rubber stator – one of the most important elements in a screw drill. In China, annual losses from the failure of drilling tools are estimated to be more than $40,000 per oil well. Equipment manufacturers are thus always looking for ways to improve the rubber used in screw drilling tools, to reduce these financial losses for oil-extracting companies.
One of the largest Chinese producers of PDM drilling tools, Orient Energy & Technology Ltd., has completed laboratory testing of nitrile butadiene rubber (NBR) containing
TUBALL graphene nanotubes, produced by
OCSiAl. Just 1.7 wt.% of graphene nanotube concentrate introduced into NBR was found to increase the tensile modulus by 30%.
Improving the Modulus of Elasticity
“
Improving the modulus of elasticity is the most valuable advantage of graphene nanotubes in our industry, because that leads to a 30% increase in output torque of our products. With that, the drilling speed can also be increased by more than 20%, resulting in a shortened drilling cycle, reduced energy consumption and less environmental pollution, greatly improving China’s drilling technology,” said Mr. Hu, a rubber engineer at Orient Energy & Technology.
At the same time, the graphene nanotubes result in a reduction of abrasion by 20% without increasing the Mooney viscosity of rubber, whereas other additives such as multi wall carbon nanotubes increase viscosity, which is unacceptable for injecting.
Universal Additive Protecting the Oil & Gas Industry
Graphene nanotubes are one of the allotropic forms of carbon, where each tube can be considered to be a rolled-up sheet of graphene. This universal additive is already on duty protecting the oil & gas industry, where it is widely applied as a conductive additive in fiberglass pipes for permanent and uniform conductivity, as well as 15%
reinforcement.
Another example is anti-static fiberglass tanks for storing and transporting easily combustible materials, where these nanotubes ensure permanent and stable resistivity of less than 10^6 Ω·cm, without “hot spots” and independent of humidity.
Orient Energy & Technology is continuing to test TUBALL graphene nanotubes, in particular by studying their effects on other types of rubber, such as HNBR and FKM. Meanwhile, the first industrial prototype of a TUBALL-enhanced NBR stator for a screw drill is undergoing industrial trials.
Range of Carbon Nanotubes by OCSiAl
Source: OCSiAl