Field Gas Huff-n-Puff for Improving Oil Recovery from Eagle Ford Shale Reservoirs

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chao-yu Sie ◽  
Quoc P. Nguyen
Keyword(s):  
Oil Recovery ◽  
Eagle Ford Shale ◽  
Eagle Ford ◽  
Shale Reservoirs

scholarly journals Cyclic CH4 Injection for Enhanced Oil Recovery in the Eagle Ford Shale Reservoirs

Energies ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (11) ◽  
pp. 3094 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yuan Zhang ◽  
Yuan Di ◽  
Yang Shi ◽  
Jinghong Hu
Keyword(s):  
Capillary Pressure ◽  
Enhanced Oil Recovery ◽  
Oil Recovery ◽  
Molecular Diffusion ◽  
Well Performance ◽  
Eagle Ford Shale ◽  
Eagle Ford ◽  
Well Production ◽  
Operation Parameters ◽  
Shale Reservoirs

Gas injection is one of the most effective enhanced oil recovery methods for the unconventional reservoirs. Recently, CH4 has been widely used; however, few studies exist to accurately evaluate the cyclic CH4 injection considering molecular diffusion and nanopore effects. Additionally, the effects of operation parameters are still not systematically understood. Therefore, the objective of this work is to build an efficient numerical model to investigate the impacts of molecular diffusion, capillary pressure, and operation parameters. The confined phase behavior was incorporated in the model considering the critical property shifts and capillary pressure. Subsequently, we built a field-scale simulation model of the Eagle Ford shale reservoir. The fluid properties under different pore sizes were evaluated. Finally, a series of studies were conducted to examine the contributions of each key parameter on the well production. Results of sensitivity analysis indicate that the effect of confinement and molecular diffusion significantly influence CH4 injection effectiveness, followed by matrix permeability, injection rate, injection time, and number of cycles. Primary depletion period and soaking time are less noticeable for the well performance in the selected case. Considering the effect of confinement and molecular diffusion leads to the increase in the well performance during the CH4 injection process. This work, for the first time, evaluates the nanopore effects and molecular diffusion on the CH4 injection. It provides an efficient numerical method to predict the well production in the EOR process. Additionally, it presents useful insights into the prediction of cyclic CH4 injection effectiveness and helps operators to optimize the EOR process in the shale reservoirs.

Nanopore Compositional Modeling in Unconventional Shale Reservoirs

2016 ◽  
Vol 19 (03) ◽  
pp. 415-428 ◽  
Author(s):  
Najeeb S. Alharthy ◽  
Tadesse W. Teklu ◽  
Thanh N. Nguyen ◽  
Hossein Kazemi ◽  
Ramona M. Graves
Keyword(s):  
Phase Behavior ◽  
Oil Recovery ◽  
Flow Behavior ◽  
Flow Characteristics ◽  
Gas Production ◽  
Eagle Ford ◽  
Compositional Modeling ◽  
Shale Reservoirs ◽  
Behavior Shift

Summary Understanding the mechanism of multicomponent mass transport in the nanopores of unconventional reservoirs, such as Eagle Ford, Niobrara, Woodford, and Bakken, is of great interest because it influences long-term economic development of such reservoirs. Thus, we began to examine the phase behavior and flow characteristics of multicomponent flow in primary production in nanoporous reservoirs. Besides primary recovery, our long-term objectives included enhanced oil production from such reservoirs. The first step was to evaluate the phase behavior in nanopores on the basis of pore-size distribution. This was motivated because the physical properties of hydrocarbon components are affected by wall proximity in nanopores as a result of van der Waals molecular interactions with the pore walls. For instance, critical pressure and temperature of hydrocarbon components shift to lower values as the nanopore walls become closer. In our research, we applied this kind of critical property shift to the hydrocarbon components of two Eagle Ford fluid samples. Then, we used the shifted phase characteristics in dual-porosity compositional modeling to determine the pore-to-pore flow characteristics, and, eventually, the flow behavior of hydrocarbons to the wells. In the simulation, we assigned three levels of phase behavior in the matrix and fracture pore spaces. In addition, the flow hierarchy included flow from matrix (nano-, meso-, and macropores) to macrofractures, from macrofractures to a hydraulic fracture (HF), and through the HF to the production well. From the simulation study, we determined why hydrocarbon fluids flow so effectively in ultralow-permeability shale reservoirs. The simulation also gave credence to the intuitive notion that favorable phase behavior (phase split) in the nanopores is one of the major reasons for production of commercial quantities of light oil and gas from shale reservoirs. It was determined that the implementation of confined-pore and midconfined-pore phase behavior lowers the bubblepoint pressure, and this, in turn, leads to a slightly higher oil recovery and lesser gas recovery. Also it was determined that the implementation of midconfined-pore and confined-pore phase-behavior shift reduces the retrograde liquid-condensation region, which in turn, leads to lower liquid yield while maintaining the same gas-production quantity. Finally, the important reason that we are able to produce shale reservoirs economically is “rubblizing” the reservoir matrix near HFs, which creates favorable permeability pathways to improve reservoir drainage. This is why multistage hydraulic fracturing is so critical for successful development of shale reservoirs.

The Viability of Gas Injection EOR in Eagle Ford Shale Reservoirs

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Safian Atan ◽  
Arashi Ajayi ◽  
Matt Honarpour ◽  
Edward Turek ◽  
Eric Dillenbeck ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gas Injection ◽  
Eagle Ford Shale ◽  
Eagle Ford ◽  
Shale Reservoirs
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