Increased oil production and reserves utilizing secondary/tertiary recovery techniques on small reservoirs in the Paradox basin, Utah. Annual report, February 9, 1996--February 8, 1997

Abstract

The Paradox basin of Utah, Colorado, and Arizona contains nearly 100 small oil fields producing from carbonate buildups or mounds within the Pennsylvanian (Desmoinesian) Paradox Formation. These fields typically have one to four wells with primary production ranging from 700,000 to 2,000,000 barrels of oil per field at a 15 to 20% recovery rate. At least 200 million barrels of oil is at risk of being unrecovered in these small fields because of inefficient recovery practices and undrained heterogeneous reservoirs. Five fields (Anasazi, Mule, Blue Hogan, Heron North, and Runway) within the Navajo Nation of southeastern Utah are being evaluated for waterflood or carbon-dioxide-miscible flood projects based upon geological characterization and reservoir modeling. The results can be applied to other fields in the Paradox basin and the Rocky Mountain region, the Michigan and Illinois basins, and the Midcontinent. The Anasazi field was selected for the initial geostatistical modeling and reservoir simulation. A compositional simulation approach is being used to model primary depletion, waterflood, and CO{sub 2}-flood processes. During this second year of the project, team members performed the following reservoir-engineering analysis of Anasazi field: (1) relative permeability measurements of the supra-mound and mound-core intervals, (2) completion of geologic model development of the Anasazi reservoir units for use in reservoir simulation studies including completion of a series of one-dimensional, carbon dioxide-displacement simulations to analyze the carbon dioxide-displacement mechanism that could operate in the Paradox basin system of reservoirs, and (3) completion of the first phase of the full-field, three-dimensional Anasazi reservoir simulation model, and the start of the history matching and reservoir performance prediction phase of the simulation study.