Syncrude Canada Ltd.

Syncrude Canada Ltd. in Trust for the Owners of

Jason Schaan

Sean Sanders

Jonathan Spence

Samson Ng

Kevin Reid

Robert Siy

Kamal Hammad

Gary Anthieren

Teddy Kwong

R Sean Sanders

A method for transporting a bitumen froth having coarse solids having a particle size&#x3e;180 &#x3bc;m through a pipeline is provided comprising injecting into the pipeline a bitumen froth slug having a lower temperature or a lower water content or both that the bitumen froth.

Transporting bitumen froth having coarse solids through a pipeline

A process for extracting bitumen from oil sand, comprising: mixing oil sand with process water to produce an oil sand slurry containing bitumen, sand, water and entrained air; conditioning the oil sand slurry; optionally flooding the conditioned oil sand slurry with flood water to dilute the slurry, if required; introducing the slurry into a primary separation vessel wherein separate layers of primary bitumen froth, middlings and sand tailings are formed; removing a portion of the primary bitumen froth from the primary separation vessel and recycling the portion of primary bitumen froth to that step of the process upstream of the primary separation vessel to join and mix with the feed stream moving to the primary separation vessel; and thereafter retaining said feed stream in said primary separation vessel to produce primary bitumen froth.

Primary froth recycle

A method and apparatus for measuring the flow rate of bitumen froth through a pipeline is provided. A flow meter device is provided including a conduit comprising an approach section having a diameter less than the diameter of the pipeline and a venturi section having in series a converging section, a throat section and, optionally, a diverging section, the converging section of the venturi section being disposed relative to the approach section, and a means for measuring the pressure difference &#x394;P between two points that are separate from one another in the flow direction, one point being on the approach section and the other point being on the throat section. In one embodiment, a heating means for heating the conduit is provided.

Flow meter for bitumen froth pipelines

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Edmonton, Canada

Jason Schaan