Jet pump system for forming an aqueous oil sand slurry
AssigneesAEC Oil Sands, L.P., Canadian Oil Sands Limited, ConocoPhillips Oilsands Partnership II, Imperial Oil Resources, Mocal Energy Limited, Murphy Oil Company Ltd., Nexen Inc., Petro-Canada Oil and Gas
InventorsJim McTurk, Ron Cleminson, Andrew Rosser
Life of this patent
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Abstract
As-mined oil sand is crushed to −5 inch by a sequentially arranged pair of double roll crushers. The crushed oil sand is fed into a hopper feeding a jet pump. Water or recycled slurry is fed under pressure as motive fluid to the jet pump. The motive fluid jet(s) produced internally by the jet pump are operative to fluidize the oil sand and the components of the slurry mix turbulently in the jet pump's tubular mixer. It is found that the slurry issuing from the jet pump is aerated and largely free of lumps.
Claims7
A process for preparing an aerated aqueous oil sand slurry comprising:
- crushing as-mined oil sand to pumpable size;
- feeding the crushed oil sand to a jet pump;
- supplying motive fluid under pressure to the jet pump to form a fluid jet which entrains and mixes with the oil sand and forms an aerated slurry;
- and
- discharging the slurry into a downstream product line.
Apparatus for preparing an aqueous aerated oil sand slurry from as-mined oil sand, comprising:
- crusher means for crushing the as-mined oil sand to pumpable size;
- a hopper;
- means for feeding the crushed oil sand into the hopper;
- a jet pump comprising a body forming a fluidization chamber, a main nozzle extending into the fluidization chamber and a tubular mixer spaced downstream from the main nozzle and extending out of the body;
- the hopper being connected to the jet pump body so as to feed oil sand into the fluidization chamber;
- means for supplying motive fluid under pressure to the main nozzle to form a fluid jet which entrains and mixes with the oil sand to form an aerated aqueous oil sand slurry;
- and
- conduit means connected to the downstream end of the mixer for conveying the slurry produced by the jet pump.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.