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ABSTRACT affect the test results in any way. No attempt has been
made to estimate the effects of water drive, faults, or
The objective of this paper is to present a better method other departures from an idealized and isolated reservoir.
tor determining reservoir reserves of gas from extended For a qualitative discussion of some of these effects, the
drawdown test data. Means are proposed for conducting reader is referred to a paper by Jones.'
the test with or without the requirement of prior build-up
to a static reservoir pressure. THEORY
The test is based upon solutions to unsteady-state gas
flow developed in an earlier paper and is believed to be POST EARLY TRANSIENT PERIOD
superior to previous methods for determining reserves An equation relating well pressure and cumulative pro-
from flow-test data. The limitations of such tests are dis- duction for stabilized gas wells flowing at a constant rate
cussed, with emphasis on the subject of test duration. was developed in Ref. 4, This equation is
The test can supply useful information if the mechanics
and limitations of it are understood. This type of infor- In C = _1_ [(Pw - G D)' - PWD'] - In r,D' (1)
WDz aVg
mation can be particularly valuable in deciding whether or where W D = dimensionless flow rate,
not to drill offsets to producing wells.
Zavg = average compressibility factor,
MARCH, 1963 Reprinted from the March, 1963, Issue of JOURNAL OF PETROLEUM TECHNOLOGY 333
R = gas constant, Taking natural logarithms and solving for 1- PWD' gives
T, = absolute temperature, standard conditions, and "WiJZaY'(1 nGDrev-+ln(1y'I+zavgWDlnC)
' ) .
1 -PWD-=~
Gp = cumulative production in standard cubic feet.
In our case n = G m , V, = G p and (18)
p,G. = z,GmRT, (6) If we differentiate this with respect to In G D , and substi-
tute dlnG D= dGD/G j"
G'n=~. (7)
z, , Upon substitution of G D = G",/G mt into Eq. 19,
It follows that 6..PlOf)2 Wnz.,y!.:
- t.G", =~ (20)
t::..G m = p"t::..G p
(8)
z,RT, Substitution of Eqs. 7 and 8 into Eq. 20 yields
and
t.pw' WDzaVgP,'
G = p,G p , - t.G p = 2G p (21)
(9)
mt z,RT,
as the equation relating pressure drop to production dur-
where G p , = total standard cubic feet of gas initially in the ing the early transient period. Taking natural logarithms
reservoir. of Eq. 21 gives
~~:) =
Substitution of Eqs. 7, 8 and 9 into Eq. 4 and simplifica-
tion give In ( - In ( WVZ;Vgp,') - In G.. (22)
t. G p
- dp,/ r-.J 2p,' r-.J - t.Pw' of the curve.
(11)
dG p = G., =-w;-' In this section it has been assumed that C is constant.
Pw
If - t::.. ' is plotted vs G. on co-ordinate paper, a straight Actually, the flow begins to stabilize when the outer bound-
t. G ary first affects the pressure data taken at the well. During
line occurs during the "post early transient" or stabilized this transition from infinite reservoir behavior to stabilized
portion of reservoir life which has a slope of -2p,'/(G p , ) ' flow, C varies in value from 0.410 to 0.472. The transition
and an intercept of 2p,'/G pt at G p = O. Since the slope period appears on the log-log plot as a curved portion
is small in most cases, stabilized values of -t.pw'/t.G p connecting the 45 line and the stabilized values.
0
In C = - W
Zayg D
I [1-
G eD
Dr -"
2(1-PWD-) -1 .
( exp --'---="..,-
(12) ')2] From Ref. 4,
If W D is small the higher-order terms can be neglected and 'da = 2( 2.2:;J) I (36)
- zav.WDlnC
,tlpavgD = 2 (32) So long as the plot of -l:;.p", 2/l:;.G p vs G p on log-log paper
has a slope of - 1, we know that the gas reserves extend
Since InC = -0.75 at stabilization, combination of Eqs. to a radius of 'da' However, it is difficult to say that a
32 and 27 gives given final point has not deviated from the 45 line be-
cause the transition from infinite reservoir behavior to
(2.67k P ,t)
!
'd -'""
- <PIt . (33) stabilized flow is gradual.
. 0198
.0194
.0190
.1
.0182
.0178
...... .0174
.01 4
10 o .8XIO?
Gp Gp
FIG. I-tlpw 2/6.G p VS Gp FOR GAS FLOW, COMPUTER RUN 129. FIG. 2-tlpw '/tlG p vs Gp FOR GAS FLOW, COMPUTER RUN 129.
.0198
.0194
.0190
.1
.0182
. .. . .0178
Gp .0 1740L--...J..--.4-X-'-IO.".7-........-.8-X.....I~07;-----''---1.-2.1..X-IO~7;---'-
FIG. 3-tJ.Pw"/tJ.G p VS G p FOR GAS FLOW, COMPUTER RUN 103.
Gp
DISCUSSION FIG. 4-tJ.pw"/ tJ.G p vs Gp FOR GAS FLOW" COMPUTER RUN 103.
The type of data dealt with here can be thought of as conduct the test at a rate considerably above the prior
a flowing pressure-decline curve. This means of taking production rate so that the pressure disturbance due to
pressure-decline data has the advantage of maintaining increasing the rate will be measurable. If a test is run
production while determining the reserves. The necessity without prior build-up to a static pressure, the data col-
of observing pressure decline limits the chances for deter- lected before stabilization will be adversely affected. This
mining reserves to fairly small reservoirs. should not change the results after stabilization, however.
Before making a test, it is important to consider the The same sort of argument should apply to stratified
probable amount of time required to test a useful distance reservoirs. If the permeability, porosity, etc., are different
into the reservoir. Time requirements can be estimated by in each layer, the pressure wave will not advance uni-
using the appropriate equations with values of porosity formly. In this case the data collected before stabilization
estimated from logs and permeability determined from of all of the layers will be adversely affected. Again, this
drawdown or build-up data. It is improbable that most should not affect the results after stabilization of all of the
tight reservoirs can be tested in a reasonable amount of layers.
time.
In general the test is best suited for small, permeable ACKNOWLEDGMENT
reservoirs and poorly suited for large, tight ones. However,
it is not always necessary that the reservoir boundaries be The author wishes to express his appreciation to Socony
found. It may be enough to know only that the reservoir Mobil Oil Co., Inc., for permission to publish this paper.
extends at least as far as the next well location. Thanks are also due to G. C. Wallick who provided the
Although we have dealt here only with reservoirs which digital computer results. '
have been built up to a static pressure, this condition does
not appear to be necessary in conducting a successful test. REFERENCES
It seems reasonable that any test conducted at a rate
1. Jones, Park: "Reservoir Limit Test", Oil and Gas Jour. (1956)
higher than the production rate prior to testing can be 54, No. 59, 184.
successful. By the time the pressure disturbance due to 2. Jones, Park: "Drawdown Exploration, Reservoir Limit, Well
the higher rate has reached the outer boundary and the and Formaticn Evallmtion", Paper 824-G presented at SPE
reservoir is stabilized, the pressure disturbance due to the Permian Basin Oil Recovery Conference, Midland, Tex. (April,
lower production rate will have disappeared. The reason 1957) .
for requiring the rate to be higher is that a test rate lower 3. Jones, Park: "Reservoir Limit Test on Gas Wells", Jour. Pet.
Tech. (June, 1962) 613.
than the production rate will allow some pressure build-up
4. Jones, L. G.: "An Approximate Method for Computing Non-
at the well, and this in turn may indicate a false stabiliza- Steady State Flow of Gases in Porous Media", Soc. Pet. Eng.
tion point. In practice it would probably be necessary to Jour. (Dec., 1961) 264.