A multistage centrifugal pump and its motor hang on the tubing at the bottom of the well, fed by a cable strapped alongside.
Also called ESP · submersible · ЭЦН
The method that moves the most fluid. Dozens or hundreds of centrifugal stages stack into a pump a few inches across; a motor below it turns them, a seal section keeps well fluid out of the motor, and a cable banded to the tubing carries the power down.
It draws a well down harder than anything else, which is what pulls reserves forward on a high-water, high-rate well. The price is that every failure is a rig job: the tubing has to come out.
| What | Why it ends the method |
|---|---|
| Free gas at the intake | A centrifugal stage moves liquid; gas in the impeller destroys the head it develops and the pump gas-locks. Separators and gas-handling stages push the limit out, they do not remove it. |
| Heat | The motor is cooled by the fluid passing it, and the elastomers in the seal section have a temperature they will not survive. A high-temperature build costs more and buys headroom, not immunity. |
| Solids | Abrasives cut the stages and the radial bearings. Run life falls with sand faster than with almost anything else. |
| A casing too narrow for the smallest series | Nothing else on this list is stopped by geometry alone. The pump and its cable have to pass, and if they do not, the method is not available at any rate. |
| Installed, before any workover | $170–400k |
| Years between change-outs, before this well's own conditions | 1.5–3.0 |
| One change-out | $70–200k |
| Fixed operating cost a year, energy excluded | $10–20k |
| Fraction of the year it is producing | 93% |
| Standard | Covers |
|---|---|
| API RP 11S, Recommended Practice for the Operation, Maintenance and Troubleshooting of Electrical Submersible Pump Installations | Running an ESP installation, not building one |
| API RP 11S1, Recommended Practice for Electrical Submersible Pump Teardown | The teardown report — what a failed unit is examined for, which is what turns a failure into a run-life figure |
| API RP 11S3, Recommended Practice for Electrical Submersible Pump Installations, 2nd Edition, 1999 | Installation and handling of an ESP |
| API Spec 11D1, Packers and Bridge Plugs, 3rd Edition, April 2015 | Packers and bridge plugs |
| API Spec Q1, Specification for Quality Management System Requirements for Manufacturing Organizations for the Petroleum and Natural Gas Industry | The quality system a manufacturer must hold. In a request this is the line that separates a supplier who can be audited from one who cannot. |
| What has to be bought | Who makes it |
|---|---|
| ESP Electric submersible pumps, motors, seals, gas handlers | AccessESPAlkhorayef PetroleumBaker HughesEndurance Lift SolutionsFlowco Production SolutionsGlobal Production SolutionsHalliburtonLevare Internationaland 7 more who make it · 3 packagers, distributors and services |
| ESP cable ESP power cable and penetrators | Alkhorayef PetroleumBaker HughesElsewedy ElectricFlowco Production SolutionsGlobal Production SolutionsLevare InternationalRiyadh CablesSawafi Boretsand 3 more who make it |
| Drives & gauges Variable speed drives, switchboards, downhole gauges | ABBAlkhorayef PetroleumBaker HughesDanfoss DrivesElsewedy ElectricEmersonFlowco Production SolutionsGlobal Production Solutionsand 14 more who make it |
Manufacturers are named first; the whole directory, packagers and services included, is on the suppliers page.
United States. Two quite different homes. The high-rate end of the shales — the Permian, the Bakken, the oil window of the Eagle Ford — plus the Gulf of Mexico and Prudhoe Bay, where a workover costs enough that the pump has to move the rate on the first attempt. And the Californian WATERFLOODS, Wilmington and Ventura, which lift very large volumes of water with a little oil in them: the steamfloods next door at Kern River and Midway-Sunset run rod pumps instead, because a submersible does not like steam.
Canada. The steam-assisted producers at Athabasca, where the pump sits in a horizontal producer under a steam chamber and the temperature, not the rate, is the design problem. Also the liquids-rich Montney and Duvernay while their rates are high, and Swan Hills. At Cold Lake, where the steam is cyclic rather than continuous, the wells run rod and progressing cavity pumps instead.
Latin America. Heavy oil with water, which is what most of Latin America produces: Rubiales and Castilla in Colombia, where volumes are very large and the oil is thick; Cusiana and La Cira; and the high-rate end of Vaca Muerta.
Middle East. The default on the giant carbonates once water arrives: Ghawar, Safaniya, Manifa, Khurais, Berri, and Al Shaheen in Qatar. These are the highest-rate submersible installations anywhere, and the reason ESP run life is a board-level number in this region.
Europe & North Sea. The North Sea standard, with gas lift: Ekofisk, Johan Sverdrup, Troll, Grane, Gullfaks, Snorre. Offshore a workover costs enough that run life, not capital, decides the choice — which is why the North Sea drives so much of the industry's ESP reliability work.
Africa. Deepwater West Africa, where a workover means a vessel: Bonga and Egina. And the Agbada fields onshore and in the swamp, where the wells are old and watered out.
Asia-Pacific. Two homes. The Chinese waterfloods — Daqing, Shengli, Bohai offshore — where the water cut is very high and the volumes enormous; and the Indonesian fields, Minas, Banyu Urip and Jatibarang.
Caspian & Central Asia. The Caspian carries it on both shores: Tengiz and Kashagan under sour high pressure, Uzen and Kumkol on mature waterfloods, Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli and Neft Daşları offshore, Goturdepe and Cheleken on the Turkmen shore.
No supplier in Caspian & Central Asia for esp or esp cable or drives & gauges; that comes from outside the region.
Gas lift · Jet pump · Plunger lift · Progressing cavity pump · Rod pump