# US 2012/0073798 A1 · Control system for extraction of hydrocarbons from underground deposits > Agents: this data is available as JSON from the patentgrep API and MCP server — see https://patentgrep.com/llms.txt - Number: US 2012/0073798 A1 - Document ID: US20120073798A1 - Status: Published application - Kind: A1 - Application number: 12/893,685 - Filed: 2010-09-29 - Published: 2012-03-29 - Earliest claimed: 2010-09-29 - Assignees: Harris Corporation - Inventors: Francis E. Parsche; David M. Daniel - Web page: https://patentgrep.com/patent/US20120073798A1 ## CPC - E21B 43/00: Methods or apparatus for obtaining oil, gas, water, soluble or meltable materials or a slurry of minerals from wells (applicable only to water E03B) - E21B 36/04: using electrical heaters - E21B 43/2401: {by means of electricity} - E21B 43/2408: {SAGD in combination with other methods} - G06F 30/20: Design optimisation, verification or simulation (optimisation, verification or simulation of circuit designs G06F30/30) - E21B: EARTH OR ROCK DRILLING; OBTAINING OIL, GAS, WATER, SOLUBLE OR MELTABLE MATERIALS OR A SLURRY OF MINERALS FROM WELLS - G06F: ELECTRIC DIGITAL DATA PROCESSING (computer systems based on specific computational models G06N) ## Abstract A control system for use in extracting hydrocarbons from an underground deposit is disclosed that comprises an electromagnetic heating system and a processor. The electromagnetic heating system is configured to heat the underground deposit to facilitate fluid flow of a resource for extraction from the underground deposit. The processor is configured to control the electromagnetic heating system in response to temperature data and pressure data for the underground deposit. The processor correlates the temperature data and pressure data with predetermined water phase characteristics to control the electromagnetic heating system so that substantially all water in the underground deposit is maintained in a liquid state. The control system may also generate voxel data corresponding to spatial characteristics of the underground deposit. The spatial characteristics may be presented as a map on a display. ## Claims ### Claim 1 A control system for use in extracting hydrocarbons from an underground deposit comprising: an electromagnetic heating system configured to heat the underground deposit to facilitate fluid flow of a resource through the underground deposit; and a processor configured to control the electromagnetic heating system in response to temperature data and pressure data for the underground deposit, wherein the processor is further configured to correlate the temperature data and the pressure data with predetermined water phase characteristics to control the electromagnetic heating system so that substantially all water in the underground deposit is maintained in a liquid state. ### Claim 2 (depends on 1) The control system of claim 1, wherein the processor is configured to use correlate the temperature data and the pressure data with Mollier water phase temperature and pressure correlations to determine water phase characteristics within the underground deposit. ### Claim 3 (depends on 1) The control system of claim 1, wherein the electromagnetic heating system comprises: an electromagnetic energy source having variable frequency characteristics and variable power output characteristics; and an antenna configured to provide electromagnetic energy from the electromagnetic energy source to the underground deposit. ### Claim 4 (depends on 3) The control system of claim 3, wherein the processor is further configured to control the variable frequency characteristics and the variable power output characteristics of the electromagnetic energy source in response to electromagnetic parameters of the underground deposit. ### Claim 5 (depends on 4) The control system of claim 4, wherein the electromagnetic parameters comprise permittivity and conductivity of the underground deposit. ### Claim 6 (depends on 5) The control system of claim 5, wherein the processor is configured to determine the permittivity and the conductivity using the temperature data and the pressure data. ### Claim 7 (depends on 1) The control system of claim 1, further comprising a display system configured to provide an image of at least one attribute of the underground deposit during extraction of the hydrocarbons. ### Claim 8 A control system for use in extracting hydrocarbons from an underground deposit comprising: an electromagnetic energy source; an antenna configured in the underground deposit to heat the underground deposit in response to electromagnetic energy received from the electromagnetic energy source; an impedance matching network configured to communicate electromagnetic energy between the electromagnetic energy source and the antenna; a temperature sensor configured to provide a sensed temperature of the underground deposit; a pressure sensor configured to provide a sensed pressure of the underground deposit; and a processor configured to control electrical parameters of the electromagnetic energy source and the impedance matching network in response to permittivity and conductivity of the underground deposit, wherein the processor is further configured to correlate the sensed temperature and the sensed pressure with one another to determine the permittivity and the conductivity of the underground deposit. ### Claim 9 (depends on 8) The control system of claim 8, wherein the processor is configured to correlate the sensed temperature and the sensed pressure with predetermined water phase characteristics to control the electromagnetic energy source so that substantially all water in the underground deposit is maintained in a liquid state. ### Claim 10 (depends on 8) The control system of claim 8, further comprising a display system configured to provide an image of at least one attribute of the underground deposit during extraction of the hydrocarbons. ### Claim 11 A system for providing an image of an underground deposit during extraction of hydrocarbons comprising: a multiphysics control system having a well behavior model including data corresponding to characteristics of the underground deposit, a multiphysics processing tool configured to generate characteristic data for the underground deposit using the well behavior model and a model of a coupled system of the underground deposit, a voxel generator configured to generate voxels for the underground deposit using the characteristic data generated by the multiphysics processing tool; a display; and an image processor configured to provide image data to the display, wherein the image data is derived from the voxels generated by the voxel generator. ### Claim 12 (depends on 11) The system of claim 11, wherein the data of the well behavior model comprises electromagnetic characteristic data. ### Claim 13 (depends on 11) The system of claim 11, wherein the data of the well behavior model comprises fluid dynamic characteristic data. ### Claim 14 (depends on 11) The system of claim 11, wherein the data of the well behavior model comprises resource component saturation characteristic data. ### Claim 15 (depends on 11) The system of claim 11, further comprising a blob detector configured to execute blob detection operations on the voxels generated by the voxel generator. ### Claim 16 (depends on 15) The system of claim 15, wherein the blob detection operations are selected from a group of blob detection operations consisting of Laplacian of Gaussian blob detection, Difference of Gaussians blob detection, and Determinant of Hessian blob detection. ### Claim 17 (depends on 11) The system of claim 11, wherein the well behavior model is configured to be updated using real-time temperature and real-time pressure data. ### Claim 18 (depends on 11) The system of claim 11, wherein the well behavior model is configured to be updated using underground deposit data derived from an extracted resource analysis. ### Claim 19 (depends on 11) The system of claim 11, wherein the image processor is configured to generate a color map of one or more of the characteristics of the underground deposit. ### Claim 20 (depends on 19) The system of claim 19, wherein the color map corresponds to a state of the one or more of the characteristics of the underground deposit occurring at a given time. ### Claim 21 (depends on 11) The system of claim 11, multiphysics processing tool correlates fluid dynamic characteristics of the underground deposit with electromagnetic characteristics of the underground deposit to model the coupled system. ### Claim 22 (depends on 21) The system of claim 21, wherein the multiphysics processing tool comprises a fluid dynamics tool and an electromagnetic tool. ### Claim 23 (depends on 22) The system of claim 22, wherein the fluid dynamics tool is configured to generate specific heat voxels and mass characteristic voxels for the underground deposit. ### Claim 24 (depends on 22) The system of claim 22, wherein the fluid dynamics tool is further configured to generate porosity voxels, saturation and voxels, and density voxels. ### Claim 25 (depends on 11) The system of claim 11, wherein the voxel generator is configured to generate conductivity voxels from water weight percentage voxels. ### Claim 26 (depends on 11) The system of claim 11, wherein the voxel generator is configured to generate dielectric voxels from water weight percentage voxels. ### Claim 27 (depends on 11) The system of claim 11, wherein the voxel generator is configured to generate water weight percentage voxels from density voxels.