A simple approach to dynamic material balance for a dry-gas reservoir

Abstract

AbstractThe dynamic material balance methodology can be used to estimate gas initially-in-place using only production and PVT data. With this methodology, reservoir pressure is obtained without requiring the well to be shut in; it is therefore superior to the static material balance method since there is no loss of production. However, the technique requires iterative calculations and numerical integration of gas pseudotime and is quite complex to implement in practice. A simpler and equally accurate methodology is proposed in this study. It requires only production and PVT data and also does not rely on a shut-in pressure survey. In addition, it requires neither iterative calculations nor numerical integration of gas pseudotime. The results of the analysis include gas initially-in-place and gas productivity index, and can easily be extended to production forecasting. Gas initially-in-place is evaluated with a high degree of reliability. The methodology is successfully tested with two simulated cases and one field case, giving high-accuracy results.