In the production of oil and gas wells, hot water/brine is produced along with the hydrocarbon product. Several of these wells/fields produce fluids at temperatures below 220 °F and have been projected to be capable of generating power for on site consumption. To verify this concept, Ormat Nevada Inc. and the US Department of Energy (DOE) entered into a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) to demonstrate small scale power generation from an oil field waste stream. The project is being conducted by the DOE Rocky Mountain Oilfield Testing Center (RMOTC) at NPR-3 (Teapot Dome Oilfield) near Casper Wyoming. The power system is an air cooled factory integrated, skid mounted standard design Ormat organic Rankine cycle (ORC) power plant with a nominal rating of 250 kW.

The 250 kW ORC power unit was designed to use 40,000 bpd of 170 °F produced water from the field’s Tensleep formation to vaporize the working fluid, isopentane. Because of the lack of sufficient cooling water for the condenser, the cooling system was design as an air-cooled unit. The system was installed in August of 2008 and put into full-time service in September 2, 2008. Prior to installation, modifications in the oil production system and the produced water handling system increased the inlet water temperature to 195 °F, increasing the output of the unit. During the initial 4.5 months of operation, the unit produced from 80 to 280 net kW for a total of 485,000 kWhr of power. The unit has been online 90% of the time. The majority down-time (8 of the 10%) was caused by power loss to the main field electric grid. For field safety purposes, the Ormat unit will shut down if the main field power is interrupted.

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