Systems and Methods for Downhole OFDM Communications
First Claim
1. A system for communication between downhole equipment and surface equipment over a power cable, the system comprising:
- downhole equipment positioned downhole within a wellbore;
surface equipment positioned outside the wellbore; and
a power cable coupled between the downhole equipment and the surface equipment;
wherein the power cable conveys power from a power supply which is coupled to the surface equipment to the downhole equipment; and
wherein the downhole equipment is configured to communicate with the surface equipment by orthogonal frequency division multiplexed (OFDM) transmission of multiple modulated orthogonal carrier frequencies over the power cable, wherein the carrier frequencies simultaneously carry multiple, different data streams.
1 Assignment
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
Systems and methods for reliably communicating data at high data rates between surface and downhole equipment over a power cable by multiplexing data, modulating the data onto orthogonal carrier frequencies, communicating the modulated carrier signals over the power cable, recovering of the modulated signals, and demodulating the data stream from the recovered signal. One embodiment comprises a system that includes surface equipment connected by a power cable to an ESP system that has a gauge package connected to it. The gauge package uses a high-temperature DSP to perform the data processing associated with OFDM communications.
30 Citations
27 Claims
-
1. A system for communication between downhole equipment and surface equipment over a power cable, the system comprising:
-
downhole equipment positioned downhole within a wellbore; surface equipment positioned outside the wellbore; and a power cable coupled between the downhole equipment and the surface equipment; wherein the power cable conveys power from a power supply which is coupled to the surface equipment to the downhole equipment; and wherein the downhole equipment is configured to communicate with the surface equipment by orthogonal frequency division multiplexed (OFDM) transmission of multiple modulated orthogonal carrier frequencies over the power cable, wherein the carrier frequencies simultaneously carry multiple, different data streams. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12)
-
-
13. An apparatus for downhole communications comprising:
-
downhole equipment; and a transceiver coupled to the downhole equipment; wherein the downhole equipment and the transceiver are configured to be coupled to a power cable that conveys power to the downhole equipment from a power supply which is external to the downhole equipment; and wherein the transceiver is configured to communicate with the surface equipment by orthogonal frequency division multiplexed (OFDM) transmission of multiple modulated orthogonal carrier frequencies over the power cable, wherein the carrier frequencies simultaneously carry multiple, different data streams. - View Dependent Claims (14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21)
-
-
22. A method for communicating with downhole equipment positioned within a wellbore over a power cable, the method comprising:
-
generating data in downhole equipment positioned within a wellbore; formatting the data into multi-bit symbols; and for each symbol, modulating each bit of the symbol onto a different one of a plurality of orthogonal carrier frequencies and then simultaneously impressing the resulting modulated orthogonal carrier frequencies on a power cable which is connected to the downhole equipment. - View Dependent Claims (23, 24, 25)
-
-
26. A method for communicating with downhole equipment positioned within a wellbore over a power cable, the method comprising:
-
detecting multiple modulated orthogonal carrier frequencies on a power cable which is connected to downhole equipment positioned within a wellbore, wherein the detecting is performed by the downhole equipment; for each of the multiple modulated orthogonal carrier frequencies, demodulating a corresponding bit; and reconstructing a multi-bit symbol from the demodulated bits. - View Dependent Claims (27)
-
Specification