Rapid Flood Operation Analysis and Optimization: A Case Study from the Midland Basin

Abstract

Abstract The effectiveness of secondary and tertiary recovery projects depends heavily on the operator's understanding of the fluid flow characteristics within the reservoir. 3D geo-cellular models and finite element/difference-based simulators may be used to investigate reservoir dynamics, but the approach generally entails a computationally expensive and time-consuming workflow. This paper presents a workflow that integrates rapid analytical method and data-analytics technique to quickly analyze fluid flow and reservoir characteristics for producing near "real-time" results. This fast-track workflow guides reservoir operations including injection fluid allocation, well performance monitoring, surveillance, and optimization, and delivers solutions to the operator using a website application on a cloud-based environment. This web-based system employs a continuity governing equation (Capacitance Resistance Modelling, CRM) to analyze inter-well communication using only injection and production data. The analytic initially matches production history to determine a potential time response between injectors and producers, and simultaneously calculates the connectivity between each pair of wells. Based on the inter-well relationships described by the connectivity network, the workflow facilitates what-if scenarios. This workflow is suitable to study the impact of different injection plans, constraints, and events on production estimation, performance monitoring, anomaly alerts, flood breakthrough, injection fluid supply, and equipment constraints. The system also allows automatic injection re-design based on different number of injection wells to guide injection allocation and drainage volume management for flood optimization solutions. A field located in the Midland basin was analyzed to optimize flood recovery efficiency and apply surveillance assistance. The unit consists of 11 injectors and 22 producers. After optimization, a solution delivering a 30% incremental oil production over an 18-month period was derived. The analysis also predicted several instances of early water breakthrough and high water cut, and subsequent mitigation options. This system couples established waterflood analytics, CRM and modern data-analytics, with a web-based deliverable to provide operators with near "real-time" surveillance and operational optimizations.