SACROC Unit Operations

Abstract

Abstract A comprehensive and exhaustive study was made by engineering representatives of many owner companies and consultants between the discovery of the Kelly-Snyder field in Nov., 1948 and March 1, 1953, the effective date of SACROC Unit. Since that date the operating personnel have placed in operation a pressure maintenance program consisting of two component parts:water injection into wells located generally along the longitudinal axis of the field andless efficient edge wells shut-in with allowables transferred to more efficient wells in the center of the field. The performance of the reservoir under pressure maintenance has been closely studied and analyzed. Practical evaluations have been made, and operations continued or modified as conditions required. Results have been most gratifying, and based upon that experience and performance, future operations and planning can be determined with a much greater degree of certainty than when the project started. This paper will present the pertinent fact relating to pressure maintenance operation of the Kelly-Snyder field by SACROC Unit since the actual beginning of pressure maintenance in 1954 up to the present time. Introduction It is one thing to discover an oil reservoir of 2,800 million STB of oil but quite another thing to produce it. Thus, in the case of Kelly-Snyder field, Scurry County, Tex., early performance indicated a primary recovery of only 670 million bbl, and that 2,130 million bbl would not be recovered if primary methods only were used. Hence, the creation of SACROC Unit and the pressure maintenance program. Despite the fact that the organizational set-up of SACROC Unit is most complex and little understood, except by those involved with over-all operations, no time or space will be taken to discuss that subject because it is outlined in the SACROC Unit Agreement. SACROC Pressure Maintenance Plan Early in the life of Kelly-Snyder field, it was apparent that a solution gas drive was the only natural production mechanism because presence of water along the southeast flank of the field proved to be only a water drive of insufficient magnitude to be considered a recovery mechanism.