Enhancing Hydrocarbon Recovery

Studying the impact of water injection in a mature producing field implies the integration of sedimentological, petrophysical, geophysical, and geological studies, plus engineering assessment and simulation modelling, combined with rigorous data base management to capture the large amounts of data from the different domains. As a result of one of our studies, our customer was able to defer and significantly down-size water injection and thus save significant amounts of capital and operational expenditure. Studying the potential impact of CO2 injection, we integrated seismic modelling, inversion, petrographical, petrophysical analysis, facies analysis, porosity and permeability modelling, fracture network modelling, fluid characterization, black oil and compositional reservoir simulation and performed economic modelling. As a result of our study, our customer had to conclude that the injected CO2 will move mainly along the fracture network and that CO2 breakthrough would occur within a matter of days (!) after start of injection. Furthermore, injected CO2 would displace very little oil from within the matrix and continuation of the current production practice would yield a higher recovery than the CO2 scenario.