A significant advantage to underground operations is the ability to place oil production equipment in facility rooms underground. This reduces the amount of surface impact and has the potential to reduce production costs through the minimization of fluids movement and handling. A large cost of thermal production involving steam is the added cost associated with higher temperature and pressure steam to transport it from the source to the wells. Underground Energy proposes the installation of steam or other thermal generators underground for more efficient and lower cost thermal recovery operations. Installation of two or three phase separators underground provides an efficiency in fluids management and enables disposal of produced water through underground injection wells avoiding moving fluids to the surface for further handling and disposal. The amount of operating cost reduction is dependent on the size of the project and the distance liquids must be transported.
