INTEGRATION OF RESERVOIR AND WELL FLOW SIMULATORS FOR ANALYSIS OF HORIZONTAL WELL PERFORMANCE

2007 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 181
Author(s):  
G. Sanchez ◽  
A. Kabir ◽  
E. Nakagawa ◽  
Y. Manolas

The optimisation of a well’s performance along its life cycle demands improved understanding of processes occurring in the reservoir, near wellbore and inside the well and flow lines. With this purpose, the industry has been conducting, for several years, initiatives towards reservoirwellbore coupled simulations.This paper proposes a simple way to couple the near wellbore reservoir and the wellbore hydraulics models, which contributes to the optimisation of well completion design (before and while drilling the well) and the maximisation of the well inflow performance during production phases, with support of real-time and historical data. The ultimate goal is the development of an adaptive (self-learning) system capable of integrated, real-time analysis, decision support and control of the wells to maximise productivity and recovery factors at reservoir/field level. At the present stage, the system simulates the inflow performance based on an iterative algorithm. The algorithm links a reservoir simulator to a hydraulics simulator that describes the flow inside the wellbore. The link between both simulators is based on equalisation of flow rates and pressures so that a hydraulic balance solution of well inflow is obtained. This approach allows for full simulation of the reservoir, taking into consideration the petrophysical and reservoir properties, which is then matched with the full pressure profile along the wellbore. This process requires relatively small CPU time and provides very accurate solutions. Finally, the paper presents an application of the system for the design of a horizontal well in terms of inflow profile and oil production when the production is hydraulically balanced.

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fen Yang ◽  
Larry K. Britt ◽  
Shari Dunn-Norman

Abstract Since the late 1980's when Maersk published their work on multiple fracturing of horizontal wells in the Dan Field, the use of transverse multiple fractured horizontal wells has become the completion of choice and become the “industry standard” for unconventional and tight oil and tight gas reservoirs. Today approximately sixty percent of all wells drilled in the United States are drilled horizontally and nearly all of them are multiple fractured. Because a horizontal well adds additional cost and complexity to the drilling, completion, and stimulation of the well we need to fully understand anything that affects the cost and complexity. In other words, we need to understand the affects of the principal stresses, both direction and magnitude, on the drilling completion, and stimulation of these wells. However, little work has been done to address and understand the relationship between the principal stresses and the lateral direction. This paper has as its goal to fundamentally address the question, in what direction should I drill my lateral? Do I drill it in the direction of the maximum horizontal stress (longitudinal) or do I drill it in the direction of the minimum horizontal stress (transverse)? The answer to this question relates directly back to the title of this paper and please "Don't let your land man drive that decision." This paper focuses on the horizontal well's lateral direction (longitudinal or transverse fracture orientation) and how that direction influences productivity, reserves, and economics of horizontal wells. Optimization studies using a single phase fully three dimensional numeric simulator including convergent non-Darcy flow were used to highlight the importance of lateral direction as a function of reservoir permeability. These studies, conducted for both oil and gas, are used to identify the point on the permeability continuum where longitudinal wells outperform transverse wells. The simulations compare and contrast the transverse multiple fractured horizontal well to longitudinal wells based on the number of fractures and stages. Further, the effects of lateral length, fracture half-length, and fracture conductivity were investigated to see how these parameters affected the decision over lateral direction in both oil and gas reservoirs. Additionally, how does completion style affect the lateral direction? That is, how does an open hole completion compare to a cased hole completion and should the type of completion affect the decision on in what direction the lateral should be drilled? These simulation results will be used to discuss the various horizontal well completion and stimulation metrics (rate, recovery, and economics) and how the choice of metrics affects the choice of lateral direction. This paper will also show a series of field case studies to illustrate actual field comparisons in both oil and gas reservoirs of longitudinal versus transverse horizontal wells and tie these field examples and results to the numeric simulation study. This work benefits the petroleum industry by: Establishing well performance and economic based criteria as a function of permeability for drilling longitudinal or transverse horizontal wells,Integrating the reservoir objectives and geomechanic limitations into a horizontal well completion and stimulation strategy,Developing well performance and economic objectives for horizontal well direction (transverse versus longitudinal) and highlighting the incremental benefits of various completion and stimulation strategies.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ahmed Zarroug El Sedeq ◽  
Neal Hughes ◽  
Tore Oian ◽  
Piotr Byrski ◽  
Jean-Michel Denichou ◽  
...  

Abstract Dvalin field, discovered in 2010-2012. The location of this field is in the Norwegian Sea, as shown in (Figure 1). Dvalin field is an HPHT gas field in Middle Jurassic sandstone in the Garn and Ile Formations – the former being homogeneous with better reservoir properties, during the later heterogenous with low quality. (DVALIN, 2020) The well 6507/7-Z-2 H objective is to produce hydrocarbons from the Jurassic reservoir section of the Dvalin field safely and cost-effectively. The well was planned to be drilled near vertical in the reservoir section and TD'ed at a maximum depth corresponding to the Garn Formation base. After the productivity results from Z-3-H well came in at the low end of expectations, it was evaluated and decided to change the well profile of the Z-2-H well from vertical reservoir penetration to a horizontal profile; to have two penetrations with a minimum of 150m MD separation in the upper high permeable streak and then drop to penetrate lower high permeable streak. This decision was conducted only three days before starting the 17.5-inch section on the subject well. One Team culture was the key to achieving this significant change successfully. The decision to change the well-profile was conducted after a thorough engineering evaluation, including offset well analysis, which was very limited as the closest horizontal well was more than 40 km away. As the well was not planned as a horizontal well, departure between the surface location and Target Easting & Northing was minimal. Therefore, a high turn and deeper inclination build were required, which added some complexity to the well design. One of the additional primary risks related to this change of trajectory design is deploying a more complex BHA design in the reservoir section with a full suite of LWD technologies run in an HT environment. In the planning phase, special consideration was needed to accurately simulate the expected circulating temperature and have proper procedures in place for temperature management and control. Being the first horizontal well in the field, thus detailed planning was key for successful execution. Ultra-Deep Azimuthal Resistivity Tool (UDAR) Reservoir-Mapping capability was considered to help optimize the landing and navigate within the reservoir section. A feasibility study was conducted, and a 2-receiver Ultra Deep Azimuthal Resistivity Tool BHA configuration was selected and deployed. During the execution, the Ultra Deep Azimuthal Resistivity Tool real-time inversion mapped the reservoir geometry, revealing resistive layers within the Garn formation, thereby facilitating optimal placement of the well to achieve the set objectives. The well execution was largely considered flawless, with the real-time Ultra Deep Azimuthal Resistivity Tool data and corresponding interpretations facilitating decisions.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Airat Mingazov ◽  
Andrey Zhidkov ◽  
Marat Nukhaev

Abstract Multidepth electromagnetic logging tool is considered as traditional measurements of formation resistivity estimation while drilling. When considering data in wells with high angles trajectory, more than 70 degrees, the resistivity measurements could be affected by several factors associated with geological conditions and logging tool specifications. As the result, during water saturation estimation formation properties could be distorted, which will lead to significant effect of reservoir properties assessment and the design of the horizontal well completion. Within the framework of this paper, various methods of influence on the resistivity readings will be considered, especially with cross boundary effects and reservoir formations with anisotropy. At the same time, propagation resistivity logging technologies while drilling with interpretation and boundary propagation technologies will be observed, which has tilted azimuthal oriented receivers for geosteering service of horizontal wells and additionally helps with take into account of boundary enflurane on standard resistivity logging.


2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 ◽  
pp. 1-11
Author(s):  
Haidong Wang ◽  
Yikun Liu

The horizontal well completion with stinger is usually used to control the bottom water cone. Although the pressure profile and the inflow profile along the horizontal wellbore can be divided into two parts by the stinger, these profiles have not really flattened. In order to flatten the pressure distribution and inflow distribution further, it proposes a new technology. This new horizontal well has multiple artificial bottom holes (MABH) along the wellbore and it has application potential. In order to verify the effectiveness of MABH technology, a model of horizontal well completion with MABH was established, and the production performance of different water cone control technologies was analyzed: conventional horizontal well, stinger completion horizontal well, and MABH completion horizontal well. The results show that the MABH technology has more advantages than the stinger technology. The uniformity of pressure distribution of the 6-MABH horizontal well is 55% higher than that of the horizontal well with string technology, and the uniformity of inflow distribution is increased by 65.25%. At the same time, although the operation of MABH technology is very simple, it should follow a rule of MABH installation: the position of the first MABH should be set at 242.5 m from the heel hole of the horizontal wellbore, and the other interval is 92.4 m.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Antoine Jacques ◽  
◽  
Vincent Jaffrezic ◽  
Benoit Brouard ◽  
Shafiq Ahmed ◽  
...  

In current economic and environmental contexts, the optimization of long, horizontal well completion and the maximization of individual well performance are becoming increasingly important. The challenge is to be able to start improving the production efficiency while designing an adapted completion for each well without compromising the project economy. The cost-effective formation evaluation technique described in this paper allows rapid identification of dynamic heterogeneities along the reservoir after the drilling of a horizontal well. This key information then can be used to optimize well completion and treatment. This new approach, called WTLog, combines well testing and logging techniques and was introduced initially for the optimization of unconventional well completion (Jacques et al., 2019 and Manivannan et al. 2019). The log begins by circulating a low-viscosity liquid that can be injected in the formation through the mud cake. The brine circulation operation is run at the end of the drilling phase, after reaching TD of the drain while maintaining a constant wellhead pressure at the wellhead. The constant pressure control can be applied without a specific additional choke device when Managed Pressure Drilling (MPD) is used to drill the formation section. The inlet and outlet flowrates are measured accurately, and their difference corresponds to the apparent formation-injection rate. The depth of the interface between the two liquids inside the borehole is estimated from the flowrates and pressure measured at the wellhead. Combining these data allows derivation of the low-viscosity/liquid-injection profile along the open hole. A permeability log then can be derived by inversion. Well Test Logging has been applied successfully for the first time on two horizontal wells in a conventional carbonate reservoir. The interpretation results were benchmarked to static conventional openhole logs and validated against the data log obtained by the dynamic production log tool (PLT) performed after well start-up. This technique opens new perspectives for optimizing well completion in these carbonate-fractured formations for which porosity logs might not be a good permeability indicator and where conductive fractures seen on image logs are not always indicative of future production.


2019 ◽  
Vol 59 (2) ◽  
pp. 770
Author(s):  
Romi Branajaya ◽  
Peter Archer ◽  
Andrew Farley

Following technical success of vertical and deviated wells, Strike Energy audaciously continued to push the envelope while proving the commerciality of the deep coal seam play in PEL96. It was clear that extending the reservoir contact area of the wellbore and using innovative dewatering to significantly increase drainage was prudent. A horizontal well intercepting a vertical well coupled with multi-stage fracture stimulation was selected to achieve that goal. Furthermore, a new application of wide operating range electric submersible pumps would enable dewatering to much lower water rates to avoid running the pumps dry or damaging the fracture network upon gas desorption and breakthrough. Although a wellbore stability issue was encountered during the well construction phase, requiring a modified well trajectory, the horizontal well successfully intercepted the vertical well, reaching planned total measured depth. It also altered fracture stimulation approach to an indirect vertical fracture completion application, whereby fractures are initiated from the interburden layer below the coal seam. A million pounds of proppant was successfully placed in seven fracture stages. During the proppant pumping, diagnostic tools (tiltmeter and microseismic) and chemical tracers were utilised. The real-time microseismic confirmed the propagation of fracture from interburden upwards into the target coal seam. This presents the integration of well performance, subsurface information, past drilling practices and stimulation treatment results to support the decision-making process of a horizontal well construction and stimulation design as well as integration of real-time information to overcome operation difficulties and optimise well delivery. Tracer samplings and ongoing production testing during dewatering are also presented.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yuan Liu ◽  
Lijun Mu ◽  
Zhengfeng Zhao ◽  
Xianwen Li ◽  
Philippe Enkababian

Abstract Well completion has evolved rapidly in the past two decades, as multistage completion has become the predominant practice to complete a well in many places. Although innovation in completion tool technology has been continuous in recent years, there are still gaps in the well completion optimization practice. In this paper, we add additional dimensions to well completion technology by incorporating geoengineering, measurement while pumping, and data mining, and we have evidence to show that those additional elements help to improve our understanding, on-site efficiency, and overall performance. Multistage completion optimization is about where and how to complete a well. Different methods were employed in the past, and even with a better-engineered completion design where both reservoir and completion quality are honored, there are still area for improvement. For example, 1) geological properties are not qualitatively utilized in the completion design; 2) real-time operational feedback during the execution phase is inadequate for in-time decisions for completion and fracturing adjustment; 3) the completion-to-well-performance cycle is so long that the learning curve is not fast enough, and too many influential factors are hidden in the details. Three extra dimensions were added to address the improvement areas. Geoengineering adds "space information" in enabling geological properties from a 3D space grid to be projected onto the wellbore as geology quality (GQ) so that the information can be used together with reservoir and completion quality (RQ and CQ) quantitatively to improve the fracturing treatment design. Measurement while pumping (MWP) adds "timely feedback" in that real-time operational feedback—either from the wellbore via high-frequency pressure monitoring or from the target zones via microseismic data in offset horizontal monitoring wells—can help with the completion and fracture diagnosis and decision making on-site. Data mining adds "pattern recognition" in that reservoir and operation data are collected and analyzed to generate a systematic understanding of the reservoir complexity, paving the way for the improved planning of future well completions in the same region. Each of the solutions comes with specific case studies in our work. Geoengineering, MWP, and data mining add three dimensions to the current well completion practice. In our case studies, these approaches have demonstrated the capability to improve the accuracy of the design, increase confidence in the execution, and accelerate the learning curve from evaluation. The extra dimensions added to the current completion practice are essentially space, time, and pattern, and together, they help to define the direction of future innovations for completion optimization.


2009 ◽  
Vol 12 (06) ◽  
pp. 886-897 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhan Wu ◽  
Ravimadhav N. Vaidya ◽  
P.V. Suryanarayana

Summary In this paper, we present a new approach for modeling filtrate invasion during the drilling of a horizontal well through regions with high-permeability contrasts, such as those caused by fractures and high-permeability streaks, and the impact that the cleanup of this approach has on well performance. The approach incorporates the drilling schedule and experiment-based dynamic filtrate-loss data into a fine-grid multiphase reservoir simulator. Unlike the traditional leakoff model, which assumes piston-like displacement in the filtrate-invaded zone, fluid flow in the invaded and the reservoir zones is described by the use of more-realistic two-phase water/gas flow equations. The equations are solved under the dynamic boundary conditions of the leakoff model and time-varying reservoir exposure from drilling, tripping, completions, and work-overs. Because the impact of fractures on both invasion and flowback is more pronounced in low-permeability (tight) formations, the focus of this paper is on such formations. In overbalanced drilling, the initial dynamic mudcake formation is critical in controlling filtrate loss. A dynamic fluid-loss model, which reflects the spurt loss and non-Darcy and non-Newtonian characteristics of filtrate flow through the mudcake is coupled with the reservoir simulator. Mud properties and different events during drilling influence compression, dynamic deposition, and erosion of the mudcake. The application of the dynamic filtrate-loss model avoids the complexity in building a multiparameter mathematical mudcake model without loss of generality. As in previous work, parameters in the dynamic filtrate-loss model are based on special core tests. In existing experiments, leakoff coefficients are measured only for the matrix. The extrapolation of the dynamic leakoff coefficients for simulation of fluid loss into intersecting fractures is discussed. Driven by Buckley-Leverett equations, theoretical analysis is presented to emphasize the quantitatively spatial correlation between the invaded-filtrate saturation and the spatial permeability reduction in the invaded zone. The influence of water blocking, relative permeability alteration, and damaged permeability variation on well performance is simulated. A horizontal-well example is used to illustrate the flexibility of this approach, and the results are discussed in the context of well performance.


1993 ◽  
Vol 58 (6) ◽  
pp. 466-473
Author(s):  
Yasunobu Watanabe ◽  
Nobuhiko Tomita ◽  
Hiroshi Ishii

Author(s):  
R.P. Goehner ◽  
W.T. Hatfield ◽  
Prakash Rao

Computer programs are now available in various laboratories for the indexing and simulation of transmission electron diffraction patterns. Although these programs address themselves to the solution of various aspects of the indexing and simulation process, the ultimate goal is to perform real time diffraction pattern analysis directly off of the imaging screen of the transmission electron microscope. The program to be described in this paper represents one step prior to real time analysis. It involves the combination of two programs, described in an earlier paper(l), into a single program for use on an interactive basis with a minicomputer. In our case, the minicomputer is an INTERDATA 70 equipped with a Tektronix 4010-1 graphical display terminal and hard copy unit.A simplified flow diagram of the combined program, written in Fortran IV, is shown in Figure 1. It consists of two programs INDEX and TEDP which index and simulate electron diffraction patterns respectively. The user has the option of choosing either the indexing or simulating aspects of the combined program.


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