SPE-176782-MS

Efficient Deepwater Well Testing

Carl Walden, Yuri Pereira, and Patricio Luppi, Maersk Oil Angola; Beibit Akbayev, and Yakov Shumakov,
Schlumberger

Copyright 2015, Society of Petroleum Engineers

This paper was prepared for presentation at the SPE Middle East Intelligent Oil & Gas Conference & Exhibition held in Dubai, UAE, 15–16 September 2015.

This paper was selected for presentation by an SPE program committee following review of information contained in an abstract submitted by the author(s). Contents
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Abstract
Well testing operations are an essential component in reservoir characterization process. In deepwater
environments where rig costs are high, operating safely and cost efficiently is important. As a result, many
operators are constantly searching for more efficient and cost effective ways to test their reservoirs. The
use of newly developed tools and technologies is necessary to deal with the challenges of efficiency and
effectiveness while at the same time, safely optimizing the operational sequences, improving decision
making with real-time information and reducing rig costs, without sacrificing data quality.
Designed specifically for testing operations, the single trip downhole tools with real-time bottomhole data
enabled by wireless acoustic telemetry address those challenges. This technology eliminates unnecessary trips
compared with a conventional drillstem test (DST) in deepwater environments. Furthermore, real-time
bottomhole data aid processes such as test design optimization and real-time well test interpretation and help
to ensure that data are sufficient for the purpose of reservoir characterization prior to ending the test.
This paper summarizes the benefits of using the new generation of downhole reservoir testing tools.
Maersk Oil Angola was the first operator to use these tools in West Africa. The well testing operation was
performed in a single trip, saving 3 days of rig time compared with the time required for a traditional DST
with a permanent packer. Data acquired during the test were transmitted to secure servers, and were
available in real-time for remotely located decision makers. The improved communication and collabo-
ration between offshore and office, resulted in a short decision-making time cycle. The team performed
pressure transient analysis on downhole data during the well test, turning the raw data into knowledge.
This helped to confirm that sufficient data had been acquired for reservoir characterization; thus, the test
duration was shortened by 28 hours while still meeting all test objectives. In summary, the operator was
able to perform a safe and cost-effective well test operation in a deepwater environment.

Introduction
Before initiating the development of oil and gas fields, the operator evaluates the project economics.
During the initial exploration and appraisal stages a large quantity of information is collected to reduce
uncertainties and determine if the hydrocarbon field is a strong financial undertaking. During the drilling
phase and until the end of well testing operations, operators are seeking best practices and efficient
technologies to help guarantee safe operations and economical viability of the project.
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Well testing is an important operation, which has a significant impact on the project economics. During a
well test, temporary completions or drillstem test (DST) tools are used in an attempt to flow the well to surface.
At the surface, various types of equipment are used to control, measure, sample and finally dispose of the fluids.
The information gathered during a DST is essential for reservoir characterization and the determination of
permeability, skin and subseismic boundaries. Following reservoir characterization, well deliverability will be
identified and a production and completion strategy will be selected for development wells.
Downhole tools used for well testing consist of four main components: a packer, a downhole dual valve
(tester and circulating valves), pressure and temperature recorders and a fluid sampler. The packer isolates
the formation, the tester valve opens and closes the well downhole, and the fluid sampler obtains clean
and representative reservoir fluid samples, downhole gauges records pressures and temperatures. There
are numerous additional tools for safety and other operational needs. DST tool components have been
developed to ensure safe operations, acquire accurate data and perform cost-effective tests.
Evolution of DST Tools
Johnston brothers were the first to perform commercial DST (Fig. 1) in 1926 near El Dorado, Arkansas.
They were also the first to introduce the downhole valve and conical packer for well testing in an
openhole. The brothers were successful and they continued to improve their tools. In 1933, they added a
pressure recorder, which was a success and became a regular procedure in well testing.

Figure 1—Johnston Well Tester

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During the 1940s, reverse circulating subs were added to circulate the recovered oil out of the pipe
before tripping out of the hole. Tubing conveyed perforation was introduced in the 1950s. The discovery
of offshore fields led to the introduction of subsea test trees in the 1960s. A mechanically operated
pressure controlled tester valve came to industry into the 1971, with a fully pressure controlled tool joining
the market in 1980. The electronic pressure and temperature recorders were introduced in 1980s,
providing very accurate pressure and temperature measurements, aiding pressure transient analysis, and
reducing uncertainties in well test interpretation. In 1992, introduction of the intelligent remote imple-
mentation system dual valve, which operated using low pressure pulses, was a major breakthrough in
testing. Further development of the tools focused on high pressure / high temperature (HPHT) and
ultradeepwater reservoirs, to enable safe well testing in these environments. The main drivers for the
evolution of DST tools described previously was to improve testing operations safety and cost effective,
ensure tools robustness and reliability, and obtain accurate data during well testing, sufficient for
interpretation. The major milestones in the evolution of DST tools are summarized in Table 1.

Table 1—Major milestones in the evolution of DST tools

DST Tools Challenges

Deepwater environments require state-of-the-art technologies to enable safe well testing. The subsea
landing string is one example, which nowadays can disconnect safely without any spill in less than 15s.
The subsea landing string control is enabled by an electrohydraulic pod, which is connected via an
umbilical cable from the drillship to the bottom of the riser at the seabed. The use of this cable is restricted
to downhole tools that require rotation. Also, deepwater environments imply the use of floating rigs which
are subjected to heave motion. The conventional retrievable packer could be released due to upward
movement of the rig, making operations unsafe. Therefore, it is required that a permanent packer with
sealbore assembly be run to compensate for tubing movement during the well test. Running a permanent
packer requires at least three runs; first to set packer, second, to test the well using a DST string and
sealbore assembly, and third, to retrieve the packer.
The development of tools activated by annulus pressure has been a big step forward in DST tool
evolution. The use of annulus pressure proved to be an effective method for controlling tools; however,
certain drawbacks are associated with this method and will be considered in a later section. The pressure
is applied at the surface and transmitted via the fluid; therefore, the exact downhole pressure is
occasionally unknown or whether the tool was activated, because there is no real-time feedback from the
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downhole tools. For example, rupture disc activated samplers are proven to be reliable technology;
however, there is no indication at surface if samples were taken when the annulus pressure was applied.
Another drawback is that the number of pressure activated tools is limited by maximum casing pressure.
Historically, data recorded during the DST is only available after pulling the DST string out of hole;
therefore, to meet test objectives, test engineers are usually conservative and overestimate the required
durations for the flowing and shut-in periods, often resulting in high and/or unnecessary costs. Conversely,
in some cases, the planned test duration is not long enough to characterize the reservoirs; thus, test
objectives are not met. The industry solution to these problems was to develop surface readout (SRO)
using electrical cable (McLeod et al, 1979). Many operators were hesitant to run this technology for the
entire test duration due to the risk of solids plugging the latching mechanism causing the tool to become
stuck; therefore, they have mainly been run during static, shut-in periods. In deepwater environments the
presence of cable in the well imposes operational risks, which did not favor the use of SRO.
Data acquisition is one of the critical operations during well testing. Currently, between 80 to 150 data
channels are obtained during a test. Therefore it has become more difficult for acquisition engineers to
notice any abnormality or potentially erroneous data. Eventually, when reservoir engineers receive the
well test data for interpretation it might be too late to change anything. There has always been a need for
a platform where engineers offshore and reservoir engineers in the office can look at the same data during
the well test and act in real-time so that well test objectives are met.
New Generation Single Trip Downhole Tools
The new generation of downhole tools for well test operations enable operators to isolate, control, measure
and sample a reservoir fluid in a single trip and also provide real-time bottomhole data using wireless
acoustic telemetry (Fig. 2). These advanced downhole tools consist of four main components including an
isolation system, which delivers production-level isolation with single-trip retrievability. Its built-in
floating seal assembly allows for running the entire DST string in the hole during one run. After the packer
body is set, the seal assembly is released and floats to compensate for tubing movement during well
testing. The straight-upward pull easily releases the packer. This simplified string eliminates the need for
drill collars and slip joints, reducing the number of individual tools and connections (Fig. A1, Fig. A2,
Appendix A). The second component is a downhole testing and a circulating valve. This tool allows for
independent command of two valves by low pressure pulse commands in the annulus. The third
component is a new generation quartz gauge which incorporates a single quartz crystal that measures
pressure and temperature at the same point in the crystal. This unique feature dramatically reduces thermal
effects and provides the most accurate pressure measurements available. The fourth component is an
inline independent reservoir fluid sampling tool (Sooklal et al, 2014; Ratchinsky et al, 2014).

Figure 2—From left to right, isolation system (packer body and seal assembly), downhole dual valve, quartz gauges and donwhole
inline fluid sampler
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The backbone of these downhole tools is a wireless acoustic telemetry system, which is a network of
repeaters clamped onto the tubing (Fig. A3, Appendix A), which uses an acoustic wave generated in the
pipe (tubing) to transmit the information. Each repeater can transmit or receive an acoustic signal (Fig. A4,
Fig. A5, Appendix A). The digital information is acoustically conveyed from one repeater to another both
up or downhole. In the bottomhole assembly, the network interfaces with either downhole pressure gauges
for real-time bottomhole data acquisition or with downhole tools, such as a tester valve, circulating valve,
firing head or fluid sampler to issue command and verify tool status. The system’s modular design
provides the operator with flexibility when choosing features to enable via the wireless telemetry. For
example, the operator can enable gauges and sampler wirelessly but operate the dual valve by a pressure
pulse. All of the tools are equipped with conventional backup control.
These advanced downhole tools resolve many of the challenges associated with traditional DST tools.
The isolation system acts like a permanent packer in deepwater environment, but only requires a single
trip; eliminating unnecessary trips. The wireless telemetry acquires downhole pressure and temperature in
real-time allowing for real-time well test interpretation and optimizing the flow duration and build-up
periods during a test. Compared with conventional pressure activated samplers, wirelessly activated
sampling has several advantages. First, wireless sampling is not limited by pressure window requirements
for rupture discs; therefore, adding flexibility on the number of samples to be captured. Second, when
samplers have been fired and the reservoir fluid has been captured, confirmation is sent by acoustic signal
to the surface, a feature not available using previous sampling technology. Third, the use of wireless
telemetry can help to confirm whether the tester or circulating valves have operated correctly by checking
the downhole pressure above and below the valves. Prior to the development of wireless telemetry, it was
necessary to run wireline or coil tubing to verify whether downhole valves were open or closed.
Deepwater Well Test in Angola Using New Generation Downhole Tools
This exploration well, located in Block 16 and operated by Maersk Oil Angola, is located southwest of
the Chissonga discovery in Angola Lower Congo and Kwanza deepwater basins, approximately 176 km
off the coast of Luanda, Angola. The primary target was a sandstone formation at a depth of ~5000 m in
a water depth of 1462 m. As an appraisal prospect, the objectives of the Cubal 1 well were to acquire the
necessary data to prove the presence or absence of hydrocarbons in the sand packages prognosed as
⬙primary⬙ and ⬙secondary⬙ targets. A well test would be conducted to determine well deliverability, skin,
permeability, reservoir pressure and temperature and to obtain a reservoir fluid sample.
Maersk Oil Angola decided to use single-trip downhole tools enabled by wireless telemetry as the most
efficient way of testing in a deepwater environment. The modular design facilitated the selection of
downhole gauges enabled by wireless telemetry to provide real-time downhole data. The other selected
downhole components were to be pressure activated.
The well was perforated underbalanced, after which an initial flow period and shut-in were performed
to identify initial reservoir pressure. Following this operation, a well cleanup was carried out to remove
the drilling induced damage and the well was shut-in to identify preliminary permeability, skin and
reservoir pressures using pressure transient analysis. Finally, a main flow period on several choke sizes
was performed to estimate inflow performance and confirm pressure transient analysis results during a
main buildup period. Reservoir fluid samples were taken during a sampling flow period and the maximum
flow rate was measured at a later time during the test.
Data acquired during the test were transmitted to secure servers, and made available in real-time for
remotely located decision makers (Fig. A6, Appendix A). Real-time collaborative testing platform
software was used for graphical visualization, providing an integrated view of surface and downhole data
to the Maersk support team. This software improved communication and collaboration between offshore
and office, resulting in a short time cycle for decision making. The downhole quartz gauges enabled by
wireless telemetry transmitted data successfully throughout the test duration. The real-time availability of
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bottomhole pressure data enabled real-time verification that the underbalance condition before perforation
was correct and confirmed that perforation had been achieved successfully (Fig. A7, Appendix A).
Furthermore, whenever downhole tools were operated, it was possible to confirm whether the tools had
been activated successfully by monitoring downhole pressures (Fig. A8, Appendix A). The productivity
index could also be monitored in real-time (Fig. A9, Appendix A). The downhole data during buildup
periods, was used to conduct pressure transient analysis. During the shut-in after the cleanup flow period,
in less than 10 hours it was already clear that derivative achieved infinite acting radial flow (Fig. 3).

Figure 3—Log-log plot. Green is the memory data, red is the real-time data

Turning raw data into knowledge during the test allowed for optimizing the well test design in
real-time. The planned 48 hours for final buildup was not necessary and buildup time was reduced, while
achieving the same results for well test interpretation. The total time for the well test was shortened by
28 hours, without sacrificing data quality (Table 2). When the test was completed and the downhole quartz
gauges were retrieved to the surface, memory data from the quartz gauge were compared with the
real-time data, which had been used for interpretation during the test. A comparison of log-log plots was
used to optimize the durations of buildup times for both sets of data showed a good quality match between
the real-time and the retrieved memory data, validating the decisions made during the operation (Fig. 3).

Table 2—The planned test design versus actual test optimized during well test
Flow Period Planned Duration (hours) Actual Duration (hours), {optimized during well test}

Initial flow 0.5 0.5

First buildup 2 2.4
Cleanup flow 12 9.9
Second buildup 12 10.5
Main flow 24 21.7
Final buildup 48 22.7
Sampling and maximum rate flow 8 10.8
Total 106.5 78.5

Conclusion
Since the early days of DST operations, development of downhole tools has been optimized to make well
testing operations safer and more efficient and to acquire accurate data for reservoir characterization.
There have been several major milestones in the development history of downhole tools. The mechani-
cally activated tools were improved by introduction of pressure activated tools, after which low pressure
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pulse activated tools became the industry standard for DST operations. Currently, the major breakthrough
in the development of DST tools is wireless acoustic telemetry enabled tools.
The new generation of downhole tools operated by wireless acoustic telemetry allows for the isolation,
control, measurement and sampling of a reservoir fluid during a single trip and also provides real-time
bottomhole data. The wireless telemetry allows for transmitting real-time bottomhole data to members of
the operator’s reservoir engineering team, allowing the team to perform pressure transient analysis on
downhole data during the well test. Maersk reservoir engineers in various locations were able to
collaboratively make decisions, manage wellbore events, and refine the test sequence in real-time.
These advanced downhole tools have proved to be an efficient method for performing DST. Using
these acoustically enabled tools, it was possible to achieve the following:
● Verified underbalance prior to perforation
● Established initial reservoir pressure after perforation
● Verified status of downhole tools during operations
● Optimized cleanup period by monitoring sandface pressure
● Reduced build up duration
● Confirmed taking samples in ideal conditions
Data transmitted by the acoustic wireless telemetry system brought light to reservoir features during the
well testing operation and ensured all necessary data were acquired to perform a successful test before
pulling the DST string out of the hole.
The use of single-trip downhole tools allowed Maersk Oil Angola to eliminate unnecessary trips and
saved 3 days of rig time. In addition, the availability of real-time bottomhole data enabled Maersk to
optimize the test duration, saving 28 hours. In total, more than 4 days of rig time was saved, while
ensuring all testing objectives were met.

Acknowledgement
The authors would like to acknowledge Maersk Oil Angola supporting this work and granting permission
to publish some of the results and information gathered. The authors wish to thank the Schlumberger well
testing team and especially Marcelo Gandra Braz, Ifeanyi Nwagbogu, Vladimir Konovalov, Pramod
Kumar, and Stephane Vannuffelen for their great contributions and support in preparing this paper.

References:
McLeod, C., Mitchell, S., Guimard, A. et al. 1979. Surface Read-Out of DST Data in Real Time.
Presented at the 11th Annual Offshore Technology Conference, Houston, Texas, 30 April 30 –3
May. OTC 3458.
Maizeret, P.D, Keidel, C., Nwagbogu, I. et al. 2014. A Step Change in Deepwater Test Operations
with Downhole Wireless Telemetry. Presented at IADC/SPE Drilling Conference and Exhibition,
Fort Worth, Texas, USA, 4 – 6 March. IADC/SPE 167996.
Sooklal, A., Walden, C., Ennaifer, A. et al. 2014. Step Change in Well Testing Operations. Oilfield
Review (Autumn): 32–41.
Ratchinsky, M., Sooklal, A., Walden, C. et al. 2014. Wireless-enabled downhole tools aid deepwater
well test. E&P (4): 76 –79.
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Appendix A

Figure A1—New generation of downhole tools called Quartet

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Figure A2—Traditional DST string

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Figure A3—Wireless acoustic telemetry network

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Figure A4 —The network of repeaters. Two repeators installed in each node supply horizontal redundancy (one is always on stand-by).
The vertical redundancy is provided by repeaters able to communicate twice the normal spacing between repeaters.

Figure A5—Repeaters are easily clamped on tubing

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Figure A6 —Real-time data transmission from the rig to remote server using global connectivity, collaboration, and information service.
Real-time collaborative testing platform software enables performing pressure transient analysis using Kappa, nodal analysis using
steady-state multiphase flow simulator to check pressure/volume/temperature properties of the fluid against the equation of state
using the PVTi industry-reference reservoir simulator

Figure A7—Downhole pressure is underbalanced before perforation and clear indication of perforation could be observed.

Figure A8 —Confirmation of downhole tool status (tester valve-TV)

Figure A9 —Real-time productivity index calculaiton