Experiences With an Efficient Rate-Management Approach for the 8th Tortonian Reservoir in the Vienna Basin

Abstract

Summary Active well-rate management to promote the efficient use of injected fluids and to demote fluid cycling is a simple way to increase recovery in brown fields while minimizing costs and preserving existing field/well-fluid-handling constraints. In this work, we present the application of an efficient flow-based surveillance technique to drive rate-management decisions for the 8th Tortonian reservoir in the Vienna basin, Austria. The 8th Tortonian is a typical example of a decade-long peripheral waterflood on a long, steady decline for which it is difficult to justify expensive drilling/workover programs. Active rate management to improve pattern sweep presents an inexpensive solution to increase recovery. In case of the 8th Tortonian, EUR 10 000 (USD 13,000) was spent to modify well rates, resulting in approximately 5700-m3 (approximately 35,000-STB) incremental oil recovered during a 30-month period. The current oil rate remains higher than the oil rate before the start of the project. Our approach takes advantage of streamline-derived well-allocation factors (WAFs) to quantify injector/producer connections. It is simple and efficient to estimate WAFs with total historical well-fluid rates, well locations, and a geological model. With the WAFs, the ratio of produced oil to injected water (efficiency) of each injector/producer pair can be estimated. Well-pair efficiencies are the starting point for the rate-management approach described in this work. A simple, single-homogeneous-layer system was used in conjunction with historical rates and well locations to estimate the WAFs for the 8th Tortonian reservoir. Connections were compared with available tracer data, and an area of interest was subsequently selected in which both streamlines and tracer data confirmed oil recovery by injected water. A key constraint was to maintain the total gross rate of the area selected at current capacity. New target rates were determined and implemented, resulting in a 30% increase of oil rate during a 30-month period. Considering the simplicity and efficiency of the approach, this is a notable result. The production response of the selected wells showed an increased recovery in conjunction with a relatively constant water cut, suggesting contact with previously unswept oil. All operations and modifications were performed at minimal cost. There were no perforation changes or acidizing jobs involved, and rate changes were obtained simply by changing pump sizes or increasing the number of strokes by changing the V-belt pulley.