Metodos De Desarrollo Eor Yac Kuwait

WHOC11-353

Assessment of Development Methods for a Heavy-Oil Sandstone Reservoir in Kuwait
Part I: Numerical Evaluation of Thermal Recovery Methods in a Homogeneous System
H. ALAJMI
Imperial College London, UK

P. R. KING
Imperial College London, UK
This paper has been selected for presentation and/or publication in the proceedings for the 2011 World Heavy Oil Congress [WHOC11]. Theauthors of this material have been cleared by all interested companies/employers/clients to authorize dmg events (Canada) inc., the congress producer, to make this material available to the attendees of WHOC11 and other relevant industry personnel. maturity of developed assets. A clear evidence of this interest is the steady production growth of HO (currently at about 2.8 million barrels/day) tomitigate current and future supply Abstract shortfall from conventional resources (Kumar, 2007). A combination of growing energy demand, declining Currently, HO is making significant contribution to the performance of conventional oil fields and attractive oil overall energy supply of the US and Canada (Farouq Ali and prices have renewed interests in both the heavy oil resources Thomas, 2007). MiddleEast has over 900 billion barrels of and the methods of exploiting them. However, their low discovered HO resources, most of which are under mobility precludes relying on natural drive mechanisms for development. However, there is dearth of publications on the their extraction. Given that there are a very large number of applications of HO recovery processes in the Middle East EOR methods and toaccelerate decision-making, a relatively (Algharaib et al., 2009; Atkins et al., 2008). simple screening procedure has been developed and In comparison to conventional oils, HO is characterized implemented. For preliminary numerical simulations, a by high in-situ viscosity, which inhibits their mobility, hence homogeneous, three-phase and multi-component numerical commerciality, under reservoirconditions. Hence their low model was constructed using known (average) geological, mobility precludes relying on natural drive mechanisms for petrophysical and fluid properties of the Reservoir ‘X’ in their extraction. The deployment of conventional secondary Kuwait. The reservoir was considered homogeneous for this recovery techniques, such as gas and water injection, is study, which allowed theseparation of process effects from inherently non-feasible because of poor microscopic and reservoir geology. Several simulation runs were conducted, macroscopic efficiencies. It should be realized that the investigating the effects of petrophysical properties and macroscopic observations reflect the collective outcome of operating variables on performances of thermal and nonthe microscopicdisplacement mechanisms that take place in thermal flood processes. This work has contributed a network of pores. Conventional displacement mainly significantly toward our understanding of the mechanisms of characterized by several macroscopic transport properties thermal injection in high permeability heavy oil reservoir. such as relative permeability, capillary pressure, and/or This is critical in thedecision on the applicability of thermal dispersivity. Therefore, their exploitation usually requires the recovery methods and its field application success. so-called Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) methods, which are aimed at reducing the viscous and capillary forces, with significant positive impact on recovery efficiency. Reservoir conditions, especially temperature, have major Introductioninfluence on the definition and hydraulics of these In recent times, the interest in HO resources has been on unconventional resources. As an example, the deeper Faja del a rapid increase. This is attributed to a combination of Orinoco oil in Venezuela characterised by ~ 9 °API and dwindling discovery of giant conventional oil fields and 1,000 - 4,000 cP at 40- 45˚C is mobile at reservoir conditions....