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SPE 21203

A Case Study of the Full-Field Simulation of a Reservoir Containing Bottomwater 21203 King, G.R.; Snyder, D.E.; Obut, T.S., and Perkins, R.L., Chevron E and P Services Co. SPE Members Copyright 1991, Society of Petroleum Engineers, Inc. This paper was prepared for presentation at the 11th SPE Symposium on Reservoir Simulation held in Anaheim, California, February 17-20, 1991. 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 of the paper, as presented, have not been reviewed by the Society of Petroleum Engineers and are subject to correction by the author(s). The material, as presented, does not necessarily reflect any position of the Society of Petroleum Engineers, its officers, or members. Papers presented at SPE meetings are subject to publication review by Editorial Committees of the Society of Petroleum Engineers. Permission to copy is restricted to an abstract of not more than 300 words. Illustrations may not be copied. The abstract should contain conspicuous acknowledgment of where and by whom the paper is presented. Write Publications Manager, SPE, P.O. Box 833836, Richardson, TX 75083-3836 U.S.A. Telex, 730989 SPEDAL. ABSTRACT A recent simulation study was conducted on a reservoir which was completely underlain by bottom-water. Thirteen wells, eleven production wells and two injection wells, were considered in the study. Due to the high vertical permeability (approximately one Darcy) and lack of correlatable shales, the production wells were expected to exhibit critical coning rates of approximately 150 BFPD (calculated). To economically justify the project, production rates of 3000 - 5000 BFPD per well were

THE SPE IMAGE LIBRARY required. Consequently, early water production problems were expected from the reservoir. This paper discusses the methods used in the reservoir simulation study to assess the impact of water production on the project. The simulation study discussed in this paper was comprised of both single-well and full-field simulation models. The objectives of the single-well modeling were to gain insight into the individual well behavior and to calibrate the full-field models by use of well pseudofunctions. For vertical producers in the full-field models, two approaches were used: the traditional pseudo-function approach and the hybrid-grid approach. In the pseudofunction approach, both vertical equilibrium (VE) well pseudo-functions and dynamic well pseudo-functions were considered. Due to CPU time constraints, the hybridgrid approach was principally used to validate the pseudo-functions and to "fine tune" key prediction cases. To alleviate coning problems, horizontal production wells were also considered in the full-field model. For these wells, only dynamic well pseudo-functions were considered. These pseudo-functions were generated using finely gridded single-well models and used in the fullfield model to describe well behavior. Since this paper addresses several current topics in reservoir simulation, such as the use of hybrid grids and the modeling of horizontal wells (along with the scaling of these technologies from the single-well, conceptual scale to the full-field scale), we believe that the material presented in this paper will provide a framework for future simulation studies of bottom-water reservoirs. INTRODUCTION In today's economic climate, unconventional production technology, such as the use of horizontal wells, is often required to produce marginal petroleum reservoirs. The use of this technology presents several unique challenges when modeling reservoir behavior. These challenges arise because of: * The inherent difficulties associated with modeling the complex reservoirs which are often targets of advanced technology The complexities associated technologies themselves with the

SPE 21203

The first difficulty arises because, even when conventional technology is considered, marginal reservoirs have always presented difficulties in reservoir modeling. For example, it has long been recognised that the presence of bottom-water in an otherwise simple reservoir requires special

THE SPE IMAGE LIBRARY techniques to adequately forecast well performance. P. 7

SPE 21203