A Study to Prevent Bottom Water From Coning in Heavy-Oil Reservoirs: Design and Simulation Approaches

Abstract

The coning problems for vertical wells and the ridging problems for horizontal wells are very difficult to solve by conventional methods during oil production from reservoirs with bottom water drives. If oil in a reservoir is too heavy to follow Darcy’s law, the problems may become more complicated for the non-Newtonian properties of heavy oil and its rheology. To solve these problems, an innovative completion design with downhole water sink was presented by dual-completion in oil and water columns with a packer separating the two completions for vertical wells or dual-horizontal wells. The design made it feasible that oil is produced from the formation above the oil water contact (OWC) and water is produced from the formation below the OWC, respectively. To predict quantitatively the production performances of production well using the completion design, a new improved mathematical model considering non-Newtonian properties of oil was presented and a numerical simulator was developed. A series of runs of an oil well was employed to find out the best perforation segment and the fittest production rates from the formations above and below OWC. The study shows that the design is effective for heavy oil reservoir with bottom water though it cannot completely eliminate the water cone formed before using the design. It is a discovery that the design is more favorable for new wells and the best perforation site for water sink (Sink 2) is located at the upper 1/3 of the formation below OWC.