The Potential of a Surfactant/Polymer Flood in a Middle Eastern Reservoir

Ridha Gharbi,Abdullah Alajmi,Meshal Algharaib

doi:10.3390/en5010058

Abstract

An integrated full-field reservoir simulation study has been performed to determine the reservoir management and production strategies in a mature sandstone reservoir. The reservoir is a candidate for an enhanced oil recovery process or otherwise subject to abandonment. Based on its charateristics, the reservoir was found to be most suited for a surfactant/polymer (SP) flood. The study started with a large data gathering and the building of a full-field three-dimensional geological model. Subsequently, a full field simulation model was built and used to history match the water flood. The history match of the water flood emphasizes the areas with remaining high oil saturations, establishes the initial condition of the reservoir for an SP flood, and generates a forecast of reserves for continued water flood operations. A sector model was constructed from the full field model and then used to study different design parameters to maximize the project profitability from the SP flood. An economic model, based on the estimated recovery, residual oil in-place, oil price, and operating costs, has been implemented in order to optimize the project profitability. The study resulted in the selection of surfactant and polymer concentrations and slug size that yielded the best economic returns when applied in this reservoir. The study shows that, in today’s oil prices, surfactant/polymer flood when applied in this reservoir has increased the ultimate oil recovery and provide a significant financial returns.

Highlights

With the current growing worldwide demand for oil led by major energy consuming countries such as China and India, securing new oil resources is a critical challenge for the oil industry
Through integrated full-field reservoir simulations, this study investigates the application of a chemical flood application in a Middle Eastern sandstone reservoir that was discovered in 1973
Small sector models have traditionally been used as a small replica of the full field models to test the effectiveness of new production strategies before they are tried in the field

Summary

Introduction

With the current growing worldwide demand for oil led by major energy consuming countries such as China and India, securing new oil resources is a critical challenge for the oil industry. Most of the world’s giant fields are in an advance state of completion from conventional production processes, such as primary production and water flooding. Because of their high potential for recovering more oil from a reservoir, Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) processes have been studied and field tested for many years. Thermal methods add heat to the reservoir, while miscible methods involve the injection of solvents (e.g., carbon dioxide, light hydrocarbons, nitrogen) that will mix with the reservoir oil to increase its mobility. Chemical EOR methods add chemicals to the injected water to reduce the interfacial tensions or create a favorable mobility ratio in order to improve the sweep efficiency of the displacement. Most chemical EOR projects have used polymer with surfactant for mobility control, and in recent years many of the projects have combined alkaline agents with the surfactant and polymer solutions

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