Quantitative Decision Making For Enhanced Oil Recovery: (3 Day Training Program

QUANTITATIVE DECISION
MAKING FOR ENHANCED OIL

RECOVERY
( 3 Day training program )
Dr.G.G.Rajan
Cochin – India
Date & Venue
EOR Decision making program

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Workshop Overview
‘ Quantitative Decision making for Enhanced Oil Recovery ‘ is one of the critical
areas in petroleum production technology . This is due to fast depletion of oil reserves than
expected, all over the world. Almost all the oil producing countries are facing this problem and
many wells have been declared dry wells . In many cases, expected crude production could not
be achieved due to reduction in reservoir’s natural pressure; Lower crude to water ratio and
excess gas to oil ratio. Many oil producing companies have drilled a number of wells than
optimum, in an anxiety
to increase crude production which has resulted in faster depletion of petroleum reserves than
envisaged.
Chief of drilling operations must know what is the optimum rate of production, to sustain
continuity at planned rate and when should secondary recovery start and when should tertiary
recovery start etc. Both secondary and tertiary recovery fall under Enhanced Oil Recover and the
production cost will be comparatively higher than primary recovery case. Production plan must
be based on this information.
Quantitative Decision making for Enhanced Oil Recovery addresses this problem
using quantitative techniques like operations Research and EORT modeling and well simulation
models.
The present workshop will elaborate typical oil production method starting from the
exploration stage, primary recovery, secondary recover and tertiary recovery phases of
production.. In Quantitative decision making techniques, a number of models will be presented
in the simplest form , which will enable participants to understand and solve the problem with
ease.

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DAY 1 - 27TH AUGUST 2008
1. INTRODUCTION TO OIL AND GAS PRODUCTION
¾ Identifying oil and gas potential

¾ Exploration stage
¾ Oil production / Transportation
¾ Composition and property data analysis
¾ Stages of oil recovery ( Primary / Secondary / tertiary recovery)

2 .INTRODUCTION TO ENHANCED OIL RECOVERY
¾ Definition of EOR in Oil production stage..

¾ EOR methods
¾ Selection of EOR method
¾ Environmental impact of EOR
3.LOCALIZED (MICROSCOPIC) FLUID DISPLACEMENT IN RESERVOIR
¾ Displacement forces in the reservoir

¾ Factors impeding phase trapping
¾ Mobilization and displacement techniques of trapped phases
¾ Impact of fluid displacement on oil recovery. ( using equation of state)
4.MACROSCOPIC FLUID DISPLACEMENT IN RESERVOIR
¾ Reservoir fluid PVT properties; rock properties

¾ Material balance
¾ Mobility ratio
¾ Displacement efficiency
¾ Areal and vertical sweep efficiencies
¾ oil recovery efficiency
5. FACTORS COMMON TO ALL INJECTION METHODS

¾ Influence of Reservoir and fluid characteristics
¾ Injection well location

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¾ Macroscopic and Microscopic efficiencies.
Day 2 28th August 2008
6. WELL TEST ANALYSIS
¾ Indicative parameters
¾ Yield pattern analysis vs production rate
¾ Production rate model
7..MISCIBLE DISPLACEMENT METHODS
¾ Phase behavior
¾ First-contact miscible (FCM) process
¾ multiple-contact miscible (MCM) process
¾ Process description using ternary diagrams
¾ Minimum miscibility pressure or enrichment in MCM process
8.CHEMICAL FLOODING
¾ Micellar/polymer flood, Surfactant flood

¾ Factors affecting phase behavior and IFT
¾ Displacement mechanisms under chemical flood
¾ Analytical model of chemical flood
9. WATER FLOODING
¾ Technical and economic factors
¾ Types of injection
¾ Water injection performance calculation
¾ Water compatibility
10.GAS FLOODING
¾ Immiscible displacement
¾ Performance calculations
11. MISCIBLE GAS FLOODING

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¾ Basic methods of miscible gas flooding
¾ Hydro carbons
¾ CO2
¾ Gas recycling in gas condensate reservoirs
Day 3 – 29th August 2008
12.THERMAL EOR PROCESSES
¾ Effect of temperature on oil viscosity, reservoir fluid and rock properties

¾ Steam properties and steam generation
¾ Heat losses from surface steam injection lines
¾ Well bore heat loss
13. STEAM INJECTION FOR EOR

¾ Cyclic steam injection – Boberg-Lantz model
¾ Selection criteria and design procedures
¾ Steamflood – Marx-Langenheim, Jones model and Suandy-Mamora model
¾ Insitu-combustion: Nelson and McNeil model
¾ Selection criteria and design procedures
14. ECONOMICS OF ENHANCED OIL RECOVERY
¾ Costing for Liquid / Gas / Steam / Chemical flooding

¾ Practical constraints involved in injection methods.
¾ Production cost evaluation
¾ Forecasting yield pattern and operating cost.
¾ Decision making for selection of EOR method.

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About the Course Director

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1. INTRODUCTION TO OIL AND GAS PRODUCTION
a. Identifying oil and gas potential .

`Oil is formed from the remains of tiny plants and animals (plankton) that
died in ancient seas between 10 million and 600 million years ago. After the
organisms died, they sank into the sand and mud at the bottom of the sea.
Over the years, the organisms decayed in the sedimentary layers. In these
layers, there was little or no oxygen present. So microorganisms broke the remains
into carbon-rich compounds that formed organic layers. The organic material
mixed with the sediments, forming fine-grained shale, or source rock. As new
sedimentary layers were deposited, they exerted intense pressure and heat on the
source rock. The heat and pressure distilled the organic material into crude oil and
natural gas. The oil flowed from the source rock and accumulated in thicker, more
porous limestone or sandstone, called reservoir rock. Movements in the Earth
trapped the oil and natural gas in the reservoir rocks between layers of
impermeable rock, or cap rock, such as granite or marble.
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Close-up of reservoir rock
(oil is in black)
Oil reservoir rocks (red) and natural gas (blue)

can be trapped by folding (left), faulting (middle)
or pinching out (right).
These movements of the Earth include:
Folding - Horizontal movements press inward and move the rock layers upward
into a fold or anticline.
Faulting- The layers of rock crack, and one side shifts upward or downward.
Pinching out - A layer of impermeable rock is squeezed upward into the reservoir
rock.

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Finding Oil
The task of finding oil is assigned to geologists, whether employed directly
by an oil company or under contract from a private firm. Their task is to find the
right conditions for an oil trap -- the right source rock, reservoir rock and
entrapment.
Many years ago, geologists interpreted surface features, surface rock and
soil types, and perhaps some small core samples obtained by shallow drilling.
Modern oil geologists also examine surface rocks and terrain, with the
additional help of satellite images. However, they also use a variety of other
methods to find oil.
They can use sensitive gravity meters to measure tiny changes in the
Earth's gravitational field that could indicate flowing oil, as well as sensitive
magnetometers to measure tiny changes in the Earth's magnetic field caused by
flowing oil.
They can detect the smell of hydrocarbons using sensitive electronic
noses called sniffers. Finally, and most commonly, they use seismology, creating
shock waves that pass through hidden rock layers and interpreting the waves that
are reflected back to the surface.

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Searching for oil over water using seismology
In seismic surveys, a shock wave is created by the following:
o Compressed-air gun - shoots pulses of air into the water (for exploration
over water)
o Thumper truck - slams heavy plates into the ground (for exploration over
land)
o Explosives - drilled into the ground (for exploration over land) or thrown
overboard (for exploration over water), and detonated
The shock waves travel beneath the surface of the Earth and are reflected back
by the various rock layers. The reflections travel at different speeds depending
upon the type or density of rock layers through which they must pass. The

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reflections of the shock waves are detected by sensitive microphones or vibration
detectors -- hydrophones over water, seismometers over land. The readings are
interpreted by seismologists for signs of oil and gas traps.
Although modern oil-exploration methods are better than previous ones, they
still may have only a 10-percent success rate for finding new oil fields. Once a
prospective oil strike is found, the location is marked by GPS coordinates on land
or by marker buoys on water.
Preparing to Drill
Once the site has been selected, it must be surveyed to determine its
boundaries, and environmental impact studies may be done. Lease agreements,
titles and right-of way accesses for the land must be obtained and evaluated
legally. For off-shore sites, legal jurisdiction must be determined.
Once the legal issues have been settled, the crew goes about preparing the
land: The land is cleared and leveled, and access roads may be built.
Because water is used in drilling, there must be a source of water nearby. If

there is no natural source, they drill a water well.
They dig a reserve pit, which is used to dispose of rock cuttings and
drilling mud during the drilling process, and line it with plastic to protect the
environment. If the site is an ecologically sensitive area, such as a marsh or
wilderness, then the cuttings and mud must be disposed offsite -- trucked away
instead of placed in a pit.
Once the land has been prepared, several holes must be dug to make way
for the rig and the main hole. A rectangular pit, called a cellar, is dug around the
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location of the actual drilling hole. The cellar provides a work space around the
hole, for the workers and drilling accessories. The crew then begins drilling the
main hole, often with a small drill truck rather than the main rig. The first part of
the hole is larger and shallower than the main portion, and is lined with a
large-diameter conductor pipe. Additional holes are dug off to the side to
temporarily store equipment -- when these holes are finished, the rig equipment
can be brought in and set up.
Setting Up the Rig
Depending upon the remoteness of the drill site and its access, equipment
may be transported to the site by truck, helicopter or barge. Some rigs are built on
ships or barges for work on inland water where there is no foundation to support a
rig (as in marshes or lakes). Once the equipment is at the site, the rig is set up. Here
are the major systems of a land oil rig:
Power system
large diesel engines - burn diesel-fuel oil to provide the main source
of power
electrical generators - powered by the diesel engines to provide
electrical power
Mechanical system - driven by electric motors

hoisting system - used for lifting heavy loads; consists of a
mechanical winch (drawworks) with a large steel cable spool, a block-
and-tackle pulley and a receiving storage reel for the cable
turntable - part of the drilling apparatus

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Rotating equipment - used for rotary drilling
swivel - large handle that holds the weight of the drill string; allows
the string to rotate and makes a pressure-tight seal on the hole
kelly - four- or six-sided pipe that transfers rotary motion to the
turntable and drill string
turntable or rotary table - drives the rotating motion using power from
electric motors
drill string - consists of drill pipe (connected sections of about 30 ft /
10 m) and drill collars (larger diameter, heavier pipe that fits around
the drill pipe and places weight on the drill bit)
drill bit(s) - end of the drill that actually cuts up the rock; comes in
many shapes and materials (tungsten carbide steel, diamond) that are
specialized for various drilling tasks and rock formations
Casing - large-diameter concrete pipe that lines the drill hole, prevents
the hole from collapsing, and allows drilling mud to circulate
Circulation system - pumps drilling mud (mixture of water, clay,
weighting material and chemicals, used to lift rock cuttings from the
drill bit to the surface) under pressure through the kelly, rotary table,
drill pipes and drill collars
i. pump - sucks mud from the mud pits and pumps it to the drilling
apparatus
ii. pipes and hoses - connects pump to drilling apparatus
iii. mud-return line - returns mud from hole
iv. shale shaker - shaker/sieve that separates rock cuttings from the mud
v. shale slide - conveys cuttings to the reserve pit

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vi. reserve pit - collects rock cuttings separated from the mud
vii. mud pits - where drilling mud is mixed and recycled
viii. mud-mixing hopper - where new mud is mixed and then sent to the
mud pits
ix. Derrick - support structure that holds the drilling apparatus; tall
enough to allow new sections of drill pipe to be added to the drilling
apparatus as drilling progresses
x. Blowout preventer - high-pressure valves (located under the land rig or
on the sea floor) that seal the high-pressure drill lines and relieve
pressure when necessary to prevent a blowout (uncontrolled gush of
gas or oil to the surface, often associated with fire)
Mud circulation in the hole

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•
Drill-mud circulation system
Drilling :
The crew sets up the rig and starts the drilling operations. First, from the
starter hole, they drill a surface hole down to a pre-set depth, which is somewhere
above where they think the oil trap is located. There are five basic steps to drilling
the surface hole:
i. Place the drill bit, collar and drill pipe in the hole.
ii. Attach the kelly and turntable and begin drilling.

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iii. As drilling progresses, circulate mud through the pipe and out of
the bit to float the rock cuttings out of the hole.
iv. Add new sections (joints) of drill pipes as the hole gets deeper.
v. Remove (trip out) the drill pipe, collar and bit when the pre-set
depth (anywhere from a few hundred to a couple-thousand feet) is
reached.
vi. Once they reach the pre-set depth, they must run and cement the
casing -- place casing-pipe sections into the hole to prevent it from
collapsing in on itself. The casing pipe has spacers around the
outside to keep it centered in the hole.
The casing crew puts the casing pipe in the hole. The cement crew pumps
cement down the casing pipe using a bottom plug, a cement slurry, a top plug and
drill mud. The pressure from the drill mud causes the cement slurry to move
through the casing and fill the space between the outside of the casing and the hole.
Finally, the cement is allowed to harden and then tested for such properties as
hardness, alignment and a proper seal.
Drilling continues in stages:
They drill, then run and cement new casings, then drill again. When the rock
cuttings from the mud reveal the oil sand from the reservoir rock, they may have
reached the final depth. At this point, they remove the drilling apparatus from the
hole and perform several tests to confirm this finding:
Well logging - lowering electrical and gas sensors into the hole to take
measurements of the rock formations there
Drill-stem testing - lowering a device into the hole to measure the pressures,
which will reveal whether reservoir rock has been reached
Core samples - taking samples of rock to look for characteristics of reservoir rock
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Once they have reached the final depth, the crew completes the well to allow
oil to flow into the casing in a controlled manner.
i. First, they lower a perforating gun into the well to the production
depth. The gun has explosive charges to create holes in the casing
through which oil can flow. After the casing has been perforated,
they run a small-diameter pipe (tubing) into the hole as a conduit
for oil and gas to flow up the well.
ii. A device called a packer is run down the outside of the tubing.
iii. When the packer is set at the production level, it is expanded to
form a seal around the outside of the tubing.
iv. Finally, they connect a multi-valved structure called a Christmas
tree to the top of the tubing and cement it to the top of the casing.
v. The Christmas tree allows them to control the flow of oil from the
well.
Once the well is completed, they must start the flow of oil into the well. For
limestone reservoir rock, acid is pumped down the well and out the perforations.
The acid dissolves channels in the limestone that lead oil into the well.
For sandstone reservoir rock, a specially blended fluid containing proppants
(sand, walnut shells, aluminum pellets) is pumped down the well and out the
perforations.
The pressure from this fluid makes small fractures in the sandstone that
allow oil to flow into the well, while the proppants hold these fractures open.
Once the oil is flowing, the oil rig is removed from the site and production
equipment is set up to extract the oil from the well.

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EXTRACTING THE OIL
After the rig is removed, a pump is placed on the well head.
Pump on an oil well
In the pump system, an electric motor drives a gear box that moves a lever.
The lever pushes and pulls a polishing rod up and down. The polishing rod is

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attached to a sucker rod, which is attached to a pump. This system forces the pump
up and down, creating a suction that draws oil up through the well.
In some cases, the oil may be too heavy to flow. A second hole is then
drilled into the reservoir and steam is injected under pressure. The heat from the
steam thins the oil in the reservoir, and the pressure helps push it up the well.
This process is called enhanced oil recovery

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With all of this oil-drilling technology in use, and new methods in
development, the question remains:
Will we have enough oil to meet our needs? Current estimates suggest that
we have enough oil for about 63 to 95 years to come, based on current and future
finds and present demand
New Drilling Technologies
The U.S. Department of Energy and the oil industry are working on new
ways to drill oil, including horizontal drilling techniques, to reach oil under
ecologically-sensitive areas, and using lasers to drill oil wells.
Blowouts and Fires

In the movies, you see oil gushing (a blowout), and perhaps even a fire,
when drillers reach the final depth. These are actually dangerous conditions, and
are (hopefully) prevented by the blowout preventer and the pressure of the drilling
mud. In most wells, the oil flow must be started by acidizing or fracturing the well.

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Formation evaluation
In petroleum exploration and development, formation evaluation is used to
determine the ability of a borehole to produce petroleum. Essentially, it is the
process of "recognizing a commercial well when you drill one".
Modern rotary drilling usually uses a heavy mud as a lubricant and as a
means of producing a confining pressure against the formation face in the
borehole, preventing blowouts.
Only in rare, catastrophic cases do oil and gas wells come in with a fountain
of gushing oil. In real life, that is a blowout—and usually also a financial and
environmental disaster. But controlling blowouts has drawbacks—mud filtrate
soaks into the formation around the borehole and a mud cake plasters the sides of
the hole.
These factors obscure the possible presence of oil or gas in even very porous
formations. Further complicating the problem is the widespread occurrence of
small amounts of petroleum in the rocks of many sedimentary provinces. In fact, if
a sedimentary province is absolutely barren of traces of petroleum, one is probably
foolish to continue drilling there.
The formation evaluation problem is a matter of answering two questions:
i. What are the lower limits for porosity, permeability and upper
limits for water saturation that permit profitable production from a
particular formation or pay zone; in a particular geographic area; in
a particular economic climate.
ii. Do any of the formations in the well under consideration exceed
these lower limits.

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It is complicated by the impossibility of directly examining the formation. It
is, in short, the problem of looking at the formation indirectly.
Formation evaluation tools

Tools to detect oil and gas have been evolving for over a century. The
simplest and most direct tool is well cuttings examination. Some older oilmen
ground the cuttings between their teeth and tasted to see if crude oil was present.
Today, a wellsite geologist or mudlogger uses a low powered stereoscopic
microscope to determine the lithology of the formation being drilled and to
estimate porosity and possible oil staining.
A portable ultraviolet light chamber or "Spook Box" is used to examine the
cuttings for fluorescence. Fluorescence can be an indication of crude oil staining,
or of the presence of fluorescent minerals. They can be differentiated by placing
the cuttings in a solvent filled watchglass or dimple dish. The solvent is usually
carbon tetrachlorethane.
Crude oil dissolves and then redeposits as a fluorescent ring when the
solvent evaporates. The written strip chart recording of these examinations is
called a sample log or mudlog.
Well cuttings examination is a learned skill. During drilling, chips of rock,
usually less than about 1/8 inch (6 mm) across, are cut from the bottom of the hole
by the bit. Mud, jetting out of holes in the bit under high pressure, washes the
cuttings away and up the hole.
During their trip to the surface they may circulate around the turning
drillpipe, mix with cuttings falling back down the hole, mix with fragments caving
from the hole walls and mix with cuttings travelling faster and slower in the same

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upward direction. They then are screened out of the mudstream by the shale shaker
and fall on a pile at its base.
Determining the type of rock being drilled at any one time is a matter of
knowing the 'lag time' between a chip being cut by the bit and the time it reaches
the surface where it is then examined by the wellsite geologist (or mudlogger as
they are sometimes called).
A sample of the cuttings taken at the proper time will contain the current
cuttings in a mixture of previously drilled material. Recognizing them can be very
difficult at times, for example after a "bit trip" when a couple of miles of drill pipe
has been extracted and returned to the hole in order to replace a dull bit. At such a
time there is a flood of foreign material knocked from the borehole walls (cavings),
making the mudloggers task all the more difficult.
Coring
One way to get more detailed samples of a formation is by coring. Two techniques
commonly used at present. The first is the "whole core", a cylinder of rock, usually
about 3" to 4" in diameter and up to 50 feet to 60 feet long. It is cut with a "core
barrel", a hollow pipe tipped with a ring-shaped diamond chip-studded bit that can
cut a plug and bring it to the surface. Often the plug breaks while drilling, usually
in shales or fractures and the core barrel jams, slowly grinding the rocks in front of
it to powder. This signals the driller to give up on getting a full length core and to
pull up the pipe.
Taking a full core is an expensive operation that usually stops or slows drilling for
at least the better part of a day. A full core can be invaluable for later reservoir
evaluation. Once a section of well has been drilled, there is, of course, no way to
core it without drilling another well.

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The other, cheaper, technique for obtaining samples of the formation is "Sidewall
Coring". In this method, a steel cylinder—a coring gun—has hollow-point steel
bullets mounted along its sides and moored to the gun by short steel cables. The
coring gun is lowered to the bottom of the interval of interest and the bullets are
fired individually as the gun is pulled up the hole. The mooring cables ideally pull
the hollow bullets and the enclosed plug of formation loose and the gun carries
them to the surface. Advantages of this technique are low cost and the ability to
sample the formation after it has been drilled. Disadvantages are possible non-
recovery because of lost or misfired bullets and a slight uncertainty about the
sample depth. Sidewall cores are often shot "on the run" without stopping at each
core point because of the danger of differential sticking. Most service company
personnel are skilled enough to minimize this problem, but it can be significant if
depth accuracy is important.
A serious problem with cores is the change they undergo as they are brought to the
surface. It might seem that cuttings and cores are very direct samples but the
problem is whether the formation at depth will produce oil or gas. Sidewall cores
are deformed and compacted and fractured by the bullet impact. Most full cores
from any significant depth expand and fracture as they are brought to the surface
and removed from the core barrel. Both types of core can be invaded or even
flushed by mud, making the evaluation of formation fluids difficult. The formation
analyst has to remember that all tools give indirect data.
Mud logging
Mud logging (or Wellsite Geology) is a well logging process in which

drilling mud and drill bit cuttings from the formation are evaluated during drilling
and their properties recorded on a strip chart as a visual analytical tool and

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stratigraphic cross sectional representation of the well. The drilling mud which is
analyzed for hydrocarbon gases, by use of a gas chromatograph, contains drill bit
cuttings which are visually evaluated by a mudlogger and then described in the
mud log.
The total gas, chromatograph record, lithological sample, pore pressure,
shale density, etc (all logged parameters because they are circulated up to the
surface from the bit) are plotted along with surface parameters such as rate of
penetration (ROP), Weight On Bit (WOB), etc. on the mudlog which serve as a
tool for the mudlogger, drilling engineers, mud engineers, and other service
personnel charged with drilling and producing the well.
Wireline logging
Electric logs
In 1928, the Schlumberger brothers in France developed the workhorse of all
formation evaluation tools: the electric log. Electric logs have been improved to a
high degree of precision and sophistication since that time, but the basic principle
has not changed.
Most underground formations contain water, often salt water, in their pores.
The resistance to electric current of the total formation—rock and fluids—
around the borehole is the sum of the volumetric proportions of mineral grains and
conductive water-filled pore space.
If the pores are partially filled with gas or oil, which are resistant to the
passage of electrical current, the bulk formation resistance is higher than for
water filled pores. For the sake of a convenient comparison from measurement to
measurement, the electrical logging tools measure the resistance of a cubic meter
of formation. This measurement is called resistivity.

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Modern resistivity logging tools fall into two categories, Laterolog and
Induction, with various commercial names, depending on the company providing
the logging services.
Laterolog tools send an electric current from an electrode on the sonde
directly into the formation. The return electrodes are located either on surface or on
the sonde itself. Complex arrays of electrodes on the sonde (guard electrodes)
focus the current into the formation and prevent current lines from fanning out or
flowing directly to the return electrode through the borehole fluid.
Most tools vary the voltage at the main electrode in order to maintain a
constant current intensity. This voltage is therefore proportional to the resistivity
of the formation. Because current must flow from the sonde to the formation, these
tools only work with conductive borehole fluid. Actually, since the resistivity of
the mud is measured in series with the resistivity of the formation, laterolog tools
give best results when mud resistivity is low with respect to formation resistivity,
i.e., in salty mud.
Induction logs use an electric coil in the sonde to generate an alternating
current loop in the formation by induction. This is the same physical principle as is
used in electric transformers. The alternating current loop, in turn, induces a
current in a receiving coil located elsewhere on the sonde. The amount of current
in the receiving coil is proportional to the intensity of current loop, hence to the
conductivity (reciprocal of resistivity) of the formation.
Multiple transmitting and receiving coils are used to focus formation current
loops both radially (depth of investigation) and axially (vertical resolution). Until
the late 80’s, the workhorse of induction logging has been the 6FF40 sonde which
is made up of six coils with a nominal spacing of 40 inches. Since the 90’s all
major logging companies use so-called array induction tools. These comprise a
single transmitting coil and a large number of receiving coils. Radial and axial
Dr.G.G.Rajan 27
focusing is performed by software rather than by the physical layout of coils. Since
the formation current flows in circular loops around the logging tool, mud
resistivity is measured in parallel with formation resistivity. Induction tools
therefore give best results when mud resistivity is high with respect to formation
resistivity, i.e., fresh mud or non-conductive fluid. In oil-base mud, which is non
conductive, induction logging is the only option available.
Until the late 1950s electric logs, mud logs and sample logs comprised most
of the oilman's armamentarium. Logging tools to measure porosity and
permeability began to be used at that time. The first was the microlog. This was a
miniature electric log with two sets of electrodes. One measured the formation
resistivity about 1/2" deep and the other about 1"-2" deep. The purpose of this
seemingly pointless measurement was to detect permeability. Permeable sections
of a borehole wall develop a thick layer of mudcake during drilling. Mud liquids,
called filtrate, soak into the formation, leaving the mud solids behind to -ideally-
seal the wall and stop the filtrate "invasion" or soaking. The short depth electrode
of the microlog sees mudcake in permeable sections. The deeper 1" electrode sees
filtrate invaded formation. In nonpermeable sections both tools read alike and the
traces fall on top of each other on the stripchart log. In permeable sections they
separate.
Also in the late 1950s porosity measuring logs were being developed. The
two main types are: nuclear porosity logs and sonic logs.
Porosity logs
The two main nuclear porosity logs are the Density and the Neutron log.
Density logging tools contain a Caesium-137 gamma ray source which irradiates
the formation with 662 keV gamma rays. These gamma rays interact with electrons
in the formation through Compton scattering and lose energy. Once the energy of

Dr.G.G.Rajan 28
the gamma ray has fallen below 100 keV, photolectric absorption dominates:
gamma rays are eventually absorbed by the formation. The amount of energy loss
by Compton scattering is related to the number electrons per unit volume of
formation. Since for most elements of interest (below Z = 20) the ratio of atomic
weight, A, to atomic number, Z, is close to 2, gamma ray energy loss is related to
the amount of matter per unit volume, i.e., formation density.
A gamma ray detector located some distance from the source, detects
surviving gamma rays and sorts them into several energy windows. The number of
high-energy gamma rays is controlled by compton scattering, hence by formation
density. The number of low-energy gamma rays is controlled by photoelectric
absorption, which is directly related to the average atomic number, Z, of the
formation, hence to lithology. Modern density logging tools include two or three
detectors, which allow compensation for some borehole effects, in particular for
the presence of mud cake between the tool and the formation.
Since there is a large contrast between the density of the minerals in the
formation and the density of pore fluids, porosity can easily be derived from
measured formation bulk density if both mineral and fluid densities are known.
Neutron porosity logging tools contain an Americium-Beryllium neutron

source, which irradiates the formation with neutrons. These neutrons lose energy
through elastic collisions with nuclei in the formation. Once their energy has
decreased to thermal level, they diffuse randomly away from the source and are
ultimately absorbed by a nucleus.
Hydrogen atoms have essentially the same mass as the neutron; therefore
hydrogen is the main contributor to the slowing down of neutrons. A detector at
some distance from the source records the number of neutron reaching this point.
Neutrons that have been slowed down to thermal level have a high probability of
Dr.G.G.Rajan 29
being absorbed by the formation before reaching the detector. The neutron
counting rate is therefore inversely related to the amount of hydrogen in the
formation. Since hydrogen is mostly present in pore fluids (water, hydrocarbons)
the count rate can be converted into apparent porosity. Modern neutron logging
tools usually include two detectors to compensate for some borehole effects.
Porosity is derived from the ratio of count rates at these two detectors rather than
from count rates at a single detector.
The combination of neutron and density logs takes advantage of the fact that
lithology has opposite effects on these two porosity measurements. The average of
neutron and density porosity values is usually close to the true porosity, regardless
of lithology.
Another advantage of this combination is the "gas effect." Gas, being less
dense than liquids, translates into a density-derived porosity that is too high. Gas,
on the other hand, has much less hydrogen per unit volume than liquids: neutron-
derived porosity, which is based on the amount of hydrogen, is too low. If both
logs are displayed on compatible scales, they overlay each other in liquid-filled
clean formations and are widely separated in gas-filled formations.
Sonic logs use a pinger and microphone arrangement to measure the velocity
of sound in the formation from one end of the sonde to the other. For a given type
of rock, acoustic velocity varies indirectly with porosity. If the velocity of sound
through solid rock is taken as a measurement of 0 % porosity, a slower velocity is
an indication of a higher porosity that is usually filled with formation water with a
slower sonic velocity.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 30
Both sonic and density-neutron logs give porosity as their primary
information. Sonic logs read farther away from the borehole so they are more
useful where sections of the borehole are caved. Because they read deeper, they
also tend to average more formation than the density-neutron logs do. Modern
sonic configurations with pingers and microphones at both ends of the log,
combined with computer analysis, minimize the averaging somewhat.
Averaging is an advantage when the formation is being evaluated for seismic
parameters, a different area of formation evaluation. A special log, the Long
Spaced Sonic, is sometimes used for this purpose. Seismic signals (a single
undulation of a sound wave in the earth) average together tens to hundreds of feet
of formation, so an averaged sonic log is more directly comparable to a seismic
waveform.
Density-neutron logs read the formation within about four to seven inches of
the borehole wall. This is an advantage in resolving thin beds. It is a disadvantage
when the hole is badly caved. Corrections can be made automatically if the cave is
no more than a few inches deep. A caliper arm on the sonde measures the profile of
the borehole and a correction is calculated and incorporated in the porosity reading.
However if the cave is much more that four inches deep, the density-neutron log is
reading little more than drilling mud.
Lithology logs - SP and Gamma Ray
There are two other tools, the SP log and the Gamma Ray log, one or both of
which are almost always used in wireline logging. Their output is usually presented
along with the electric and porosity logs described above. They are indispensable
as additional guides to the nature of the rock around the borehole.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 31
The SP log, known variously as a "Spontaneous Potential","Self Potential"
or "Shale Potential" log is a voltmeter measurement of the voltage or electrical
potential difference between the mud in the hole at a particular depth and a copper
ground stake driven into the surface of the earth a short distance from the borehole.
A salinity difference between the drilling mud and the formation water acts
as a natural battery and will cause several voltage effects. This "battery" causes a
movement of charged ions between the hole and the formation water where there is
enough permeability in the rock. The most important voltage is set up as a
permeable formation permits ion movement, reducing the voltage between the
formation water and the mud. Sections of the borehole where this occurs then have
a voltage difference with other non permeable sections where ion movement is
restricted. Vertical ion movement in the mud column occurs much more slowly
because the mud is not circulating while the drill pipe is out of the hole.
The copper surface stake provides a reference point against which the SP
voltage is measured for each part of the borehole. There can also be several other
minor voltages, due for example to mud filtrate streaming into the formation under
the effect of an overbalanced mud system. This flow carries ions and is a voltage
generating current. These other voltages are secondary in importance to the voltage
resulting from the salinity contrast between mud and formation water.
The nuances of the SP log are still being researched. In theory, almost all
porous rocks contain water. Some pores are completely filled with water. Others
have a thin layer of water molecules wetting the surface of the rock, with gas or oil
filling the rest of the pore. In sandstones and porous limestones there is a
continuous layer of water throughout the formation. If there is even a little
permeability to water, ions can move through the rock and decrease the voltage
difference with the mud nearby. Shales do not allow water or ion movement.
Although they may have a large water content, it is bound to the surface of the flat
Dr.G.G.Rajan 32
clay crystals comprising the shale. Thus mud opposite shale sections maintains its
voltage difference with the surrounding rock. As the SP logging tool is drawn up
the hole it measures the voltage difference between the reference stake and the
mud opposite shale and sandstone or limestone sections. The resulting log curve
reflects the permeability of the rocks and, indirectly, their lithology. SP curves
degrade over time, as the ions diffuse up and down the mud column. It also can
suffer from stray voltages caused by other logging tools that are run with it. Older,
simpler logs often have better SP curves than more modern logs for this reason.
With experience in an area, a good SP curve can even allow a skilled interpreter to
infer sedimentary environments such as deltas, point bars or offshore tidal deposits.
The gamma ray log is a measurement of naturally occurring gamma radiation from
the borehole walls. Sandstones are usually nonradioactive quartz and limestones
are nonradioactive calcite. Shales however, are naturally radioactive due to
potassium isotopes in clays, and adsorbed uranium and thorium. Thus the presence
or absence of gamma rays in a borehole is an indication of the amount of shale or
clay in the surrounding formation. The gamma ray log is useful in holes drilled
with air or with oil based muds, as these wells have no SP voltage. Even in water-
based muds, the gamma ray and SP logs are often run together. They comprise a
check on each other and can indicate unusual shale sections which may either not
be radioactive, or may have an abnormal ionic chemistry. The gamma ray log is
also useful to detect coal beds, which, depending on the local geology, can have
either low radiation levels, or high radiation levels due to adsorption of uranium. In
addition, the gamma ray log will work inside a steel casing, making it essential
when a cased well must be evaluated.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 33
Interpreting the tools
The immediate questions that have to be answered in deciding to complete a
well or to plug and abandon (P&A) it are:
Do any zones in the well contain producible hydrocarbons?
How much?
How much, if any, water will be produced with them?
The elementary approach to answering these questions uses the
Archie Equation
Archie's law
In petro physics , Archie's law relates the in-situ electrical conductivity of
sedimentary rock to its porosity and brine saturation:
Here, φ denotes the porosity, Ct the electrical conductivity of the fluid

saturated rock, Cw represents the electrical conductivity of the brine, Sw is the brine
saturation, m is the cementation exponent of the rock (usually in the range 1.8–
2.0), and n is the saturation exponent (usually close to 2).
Reformulated for electrical resistivity, the equation reads
with Rt for the fluid saturated rock resistivity, and Rw for the brine resistivity.
The factor 1 / φm is also called formation factor.
It is a purely empirical law attempting to describe ion flow (mostly sodium
and chlorine) in clean, consolidated sands, with varying inter granular porosity.
Electrical conduction is assumed not to be present within the rock grains.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 34
Cementation and saturation exponents
The exponent m has been observed near 1.3 for unconsolidated sands, and is
believed to increase with cementation. Common values for this cementation
exponent for consolidated sandstones are 1.8 < m < 2.0. Similarly, the saturation
exponent n usually is fixed to values close to 2.
Measuring the exponents
In petrophysics, the only reliable source for the numerical value of both
exponents is experiments on sand plugs from cored wells. The brine conductivity
can be measured directly on produced water samples. Alternatively, the brine
conductivity and the cementation exponent can also be inferred from down hole
electrical conductivity measurements across brine-saturated intervals. For brine-
saturated intervals Archie's equation can be written as
Hence, plotting the logarithm of the measured in-situ electrical conductivity

against the logarithm of the measured in-situ porosity (a so-called Pickett plot),
according to Archie's equation a straight-line relationship is expected with slope
equal to the cementation exponent and intercept equal to the logarithm of the in-
situ brine conductivity.
Origin
Archie's law is named after Gus Archie (1907–1978) who developed this
empirical quantitative relationship between porosity, electrical conductivity, and
brine saturation of rocks. Archie's law laid the foundation for modern well log
interpretation as it relates borehole electrical conductivity measurements to
hydrocarbon saturations (which, for fluid saturated rock, equals 1 − Sw).

Dr.G.G.Rajan 35
Composition and Property data Analysis
Type of wells:
Oil wells come in many varieties. By produced fluid, there can be wells that
produce oil, wells that produce oil and natural gas, or wells that only produce
natural gas. Natural gas is almost always a byproduct of producing oil, since
the small, light gas carbon chains come out of solution as it undergoes pressure
reduction from the reservoir to the surface, similar to uncapping a bottle of soda
pop where the carbon dioxide effervesces. Unwanted natural gas can be a disposal
problem at the well site. If there is no market for natural gas near the wellhead , it
is virtually valueless since it must be piped to the end user.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 36
Until recently, such unwanted gas was burned off at the wellsite, but due to
environmental concerns this practice is becoming less common. Often, unwanted
(or 'stranded' gas without a market) gas is pumped back into the reservoir with
an 'injection' well for disposal or repressurizing the producing formation.
Another solution is to export the natural gas as a liquid. Gas-to-liquid,
(GTL) is a developing technology that converts stranded natural gas into synthetic
gasoline, diesel or jet fuel through the Fischer-Tropsch process developed in Word
War II Germany. Such fuels can be transported through conventional pipelines and
tankers to users. Proponents claim GTL fuels burn cleaner than comparable
petroleum fuels. Most major international oil companies are in advanced
development stages of GTL production, with a world-scale (140,000 bbl/day) GTL
plant in Qatar scheduled to come online before 2010. In locations such as the
United States with a high natural gas demand, pipelines are constructed to take the
gas from the wellsite to the end consumer.
Another obvious way to classify oil wells is by land or offshore wells.
There is very little difference in the well itself. An offshore well targets a reservoir
that happens to be underneath an ocean. Due to logistics, drilling an offshore well
is far more costly than an onshore well. By far the most common type is the
onshore well. These wells dot the Southern and Central Great Plains, Southwestern
United States, and are the most common well in the Middle East.
Another way to classify oil wells is by their purpose in contributing to the
development of a resource.
They can be characterized as:
• Production wells are drilled primarily for producing oil or gas, once the
producing structure and characteristics are determined
• Appraisal wells are used to assess characteristics (such as flow rate) of a
proven hydrocarbon accumulation
Dr.G.G.Rajan 37
• Exploration wells are drilled purely for exploratory (information
gathering) purposes in a new area
• Wildcat wells are drilled based on a large element of hope, in a frontier
area where little is known about the subsurface. In the early days of oil
exploration in Texas, wildcats were common as productive areas were
not yet established. In modern times, oil exploration in many areas has
reached a very mature phase and the chances of finding oil simply by
drilling at random are very low, and much more effort is placed in
exploration and appraisal wells.
At a producing well site, active wells may be further categorized as:
• Oil producers producing predominantly liquid hydrocarbons, but mostly
with some associated gas.
• Gas producers producing almost entirely gaseous hydrocarbons.
• Water injectors injecting water into the formation to maintain reservoir
pressure or simply to dispose of water produced with the hydrocarbons
because even after treatment, it would be too oily and too saline to be
considered clean for dumping overboard, let alone into a fresh water
source, in the case of onshore wells. Frequently water injection has an
element of reservoir management and produced water disposal.
• Aquifer producers intentionally producing reservoir water for re-injection
to manage pressure. This is in effect moving reservoir water from where
it is not as useful to where it is more useful. These wells will generally
only be used if produced water from the oil or gas producers is
insufficient for reservoir management purposes. Using aquifer produced
water rather than sea water is due to the chemistry.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 38
• Gas injectors injecting gas into the reservoir often as a means of disposal
or sequestering for later production, but also to maintain reservoir
pressure.
Lahee classification
• New Field Wildcat (NFW) – far from other producing fields and on a
structure that has not previously produced.
• New Pool Wildcat (NPW) – new pools on already producing structure.
• Deeper Pool Test (DPT) – on already producing structure and pool, but
on a deeper pay zone.
• Shallower Pool Test (SPT) – on already producing structure and pool, but
on a shallower pay zone.
• Outpost (OUT) – usually two or more locations from nearest productive
area.
• Development Well (DEV) – can be on the extension of a pay zone, or
between existing wells (Infill).

Dr.G.G.Rajan 39
Typical product crude oil composition from well
Aging vs Yie ld - crude we lls
80.0
70.0
60.0
50.0
kbbl/d
40.0
30.0
20.0
10.0
0.0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
oil kbbl/d 37.0 26.4 20.8 17.1 14.6 12.6 11.0
wate r kbbl/d 45.9 59.9 65.4 67.2 69.4 70.7 72.0
ye ar of ope ration
oil kbbl/d water kbbl/d
Associated gas yield from the well for the same period
Gas yield
9.0
8.0
7.0
6.0
mmscfd
5.0
4.0
3.0
2.0
1.0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Gas yield

Dr.G.G.Rajan 40
Crude oil coming from the well has associated gas, crude oil and water ,
which vary with aging of the well. Above figures are the output details from a
typical well for crude oil, water and associated gas . It may be noted from the
above figures, the crude oil component and associated gas from the well output has
a declining tendency , while the water content starts increasing.
The production stage is the most important stage of a well's life, when the oil
and gas are produced. By this time, the oil rigs and workover rigs used to drill and
complete the well have moved off the wellbore, and the top is usually outfitted
with a collection of valves called a production tree.
These valves regulate pressures, control flows, and allow access to the
wellbore in case further completion work is needed. From the outlet valve of the
production tree, the flow can be connected to a distribution network of pipelines
and tanks to supply the product to refineries, natural gas compressor stations, or oil
export terminals.
As long as the pressure in the reservoir remains high enough, the
production tree is all that is required to produce the well. If the pressure depletes
and it is considered economically viable, an artificial lift method mentioned in
the completions section can be employed.
Workovers are often necessary in older wells, which may need smaller
diameter tubing, scale or paraffin removal, acid matrix jobs, or completing
new zones of interest in a shallower reservoir. Such remedial work can be
performed using workover rigs – also known as pulling units to pull and replace
tubing, or by the use of a well intervention technique called coiled tubing.
Enhanced recovery methods such as waterflooding, steam flooding, or
CO2 flooding may be used to increase reservoir pressure and provide a
"sweep" effect to push hydrocarbons out of the reservoir.
Dr.G.G.Rajan 41
Such methods require the use of injection wells (often chosen from old
production wells in a carefully determined pattern), and are used when facing
problems with reservoir pressure depletion, high oil viscosity, or can even be
employed early in a field's life.
In certain cases – depending on the reservoir's geo=mechanics – reservoir
engineers may determine that ultimate recoverable oil may be increased by
applying a water flooding strategy early in the field's development rather than later.
Such enhanced recovery techniques are often called "tertiary recovery".
Oil extraction and recovery
Oil Recovery stages
1. Primary recovery
If the underground pressure in the oil reservoir is sufficient, then this
pressure will force the oil to the surface. Gaseous fuels, natural gas or water are
usually present, which also supply needed underground pressure.
In this situation, it is sufficient to place a complex arrangement of valves
(the Christmas tree) on the well head to connect the well to a pipeline network for
storage and processing.
Usually, about 20% of the oil in a reservoir can be extracted using primary
recovery methods.
2. Secondary recovery
Over the lifetime of the well the pressure will fall, and at some point there
will be insufficient underground pressure to force the oil to the surface. If
economical, as often is, the remaining oil in the well is extracted using secondary
oil recovery methods (see: energy balance and net energy gain).
Secondary oil recovery uses various techniques to aid in recovering oil from
depleted or low-pressure reservoirs. Sometimes pumps, such as beam pumps and
electrical submersible pumps (ESPs), are used to bring the oil to the surface. Other
Dr.G.G.Rajan 42
secondary recovery techniques increase the reservoir's pressure by water injection,
natural gas reinjection and gas lift, which injects air, carbon dioxide or some other
gas into the reservoir.
Together, primary and secondary recovery generally allow 25% to 35%
of the reservoir's oil to be recovered.
3. Tertiary recovery
Tertiary oil recovery reduces the oil's viscosity to increase oil production.
Thermally enhanced oil recovery methods (TEOR) are tertiary recovery
techniques that heat the oil and make it easier to extract. Steam injection is
the most common form of TEOR, and is often done with a cogeneration plant.
In this type of cogeneration plant, a gas turbine is used to generate electricity
and the waste heat is used to produce steam, which is then injected into the
reservoir.
This form of recovery is used extensively to increase oil production in the
San Joaquin Valley, which has very heavy oil, yet accounts for 10% of the United
States' oil production. In-situ burning is another form of TEOR, but instead of
steam, some of the oil is burned to heat the surrounding oil. Occasionally,
detergents are also used to decrease oil viscosity as a tertiary oil recovery
method.
Another method to reduce viscosity is carbon dioxide flooding.
Tertiary recovery allows another 5% to 15% of the reservoir's oil to be recovered.
Tertiary recovery begins when secondary oil recovery isn't enough to
continue adequate production, but only when the oil can still be extracted
profitably.
This depends on the cost of the extraction method and the current price of
crude oil. When prices are high, previously unprofitable wells are brought back
into production and when they are low, production is curtailed.
Dr.G.G.Rajan 43
Recovery rates
The amount of oil that is recoverable is determined by a number of factors

including the permeability of the rocks, the strength of natural drives (the gas
present, pressure from adjacent water or gravity), and the viscosity of the oil.
When the reservoir rocks are "tight" such as shale, oil generally cannot flow
through but when they are permeable such as in sandstone, oil flows freely. The
flow of oil is often helped by natural pressures surrounding the reservoir rocks
including natural gas that may be dissolved in the oil (see Gas oil ratio), natural gas
present above the oil, water below the oil and the strength of gravity. Oils tend to
span a large range of viscosity from liquids as light as gasoline to heavy as tar. The
lightest forms tend to result in higher production rates.
Life of a well
The creation and life of a well can be divided up into five segments:
o Planning
o Drilling
o Completion
o Production
o Abandonment
Abandonment
When the well no longer produces or produces so poorly that it is a liability,

it is abandoned. In this process, tubing is removed from the well and sections of
well bore are filled with cement to isolate the flow path between gas and water
zones from each other, as well as the surface.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 44
Completely filling the well bore with cement is costly and unnecessary. The
surface around the wellhead is then excavated, and the wellhead and casing are cut
off, a cap is welded in place and then buried.
The production from an oil well declines in production. The point at which
the well no longer makes a profit and is plugged and abandoned is called the
“economic limit.” The equation to determine the economic limit contains four
factors, namely: (1) taxes, (2) operating cost, (3) oil price, and (4) royalty. When
oil taxes are raised, the economic limit is raised. When oil price is increased, the
economic limit is lowered.
When the economic limit is raised, the life of the well is decreased. Proven
oil reserves are lost when the life of an oil well is decreased. Inversely, when the
economic limit is lowered, the life of the well is increased. Proven oil reserves are
increased when the life of the well is increased.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 45
2. INTRODUCTION TO ENHANCED OIL RECOVERY
Introduction :
Conventional techniques of extraction of crude oil from oil wells can deliver
only 10 percent of that oil economically ( e.g. about 30 billion barrels from an
estimated stock of 300 barrels as in USA ). What about the remaining 270 bilIion
barrels?
This chapter assesses the potential of enhanced recovery techniques for
freeing more of this oil from the sandstone and limestone formations in which it is
trapped. The methods for doing this include injecting steam, chemicals, or carbon
dioxide to either break the oil loose and push it up or make it easier to flow.
The question is at what price? At current world oil prices, enhanced oil
recovery methods could yield from 11 to 29 billion additional barrels of that
trapped oil ( 3.6 to 10 % ). And at oil prices comparable to those required to
produce synthetic oil from coal, enhanced recovery methods could increase the
yield to as much as 42 billion extra barrels of oil. At the utmost, about 51 billion
barrels might be recoverable, assuming the most favorable economic factors and
technologies that can now be foreseen.
Original oil in place is the estimated quantity of oil present in a particular
reservoir. In general, oil recovery as explained above are primary recovery,
secondary recovery and tertiary recovery.
Average worldwide quantum of oil recovery is as given below. This may
change from well to well and location to location.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 46
Primary Recovery
• The initial stage in producing oil from a reservoir is called primary
production. During this stage oil is forced to the surface by such natural
forces as: Expansion of oil, expansion of the contained gas, or both;
• Ddisplacement by migration of naturally pressurized water from a
communicating zone (i.e., a natural water drive);and
• Drainage downward from a high elevationin a reservoir to wells
penetrating lower elevations.
The natural expulsive forces present in a given reservoir depend on rock and fluid
properties, geologic structure and geometry of the reservoir, and to some degree on
the rate of oil and gas production.
Several of the forces may be present in a given reservoir.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 47
Recovery efficiencies in the primary stage vary from less than 10 percent to
slightly more than 50 percent of the oil in place.
Estimates of cumulative oil production, cumulative ultimate oil recovery, and
cumulative original oil in place for 1959-75 are given in table 5.
Secondary Recovery
Most of a reservoir’s oil remains in place after the natural energy
pressurizing the reservoir has been dissipated. Several techniques for injecting
fluids into an oil reservoir to augment the natural forces have been widely used for

Dr.G.G.Rajan 48
many years. Such fluid injection is generally known as secondary recovery. Fluids,
most commonly natural gas and water, are injected through one series of wells to
force oil toward another series of wells.
The pattern of injection and production wells most appropriate to a reservoir
are a matter of technical and economic judgment. There is nothing inherent in
fluid injection processes that requires their use only after the natural energy in a
reservoir is exhausted. Indeed, it is frequently desirable to initiate such processes
as soon as sufficient knowledge is available of the geology of the reservoir and the
type of natural expulsive forces that are operative.
When water is the injection fluid, the process is commonly called water
flooding. If water is used to supplement a partially active natural water drive, the
process is classified as a pressure maintenance project. When natural gas is
injected, the operation is also called a pressure maintenance project. Injection of
natural gas was widely used in the era of abundant low-cost gas, but the practice
has decreased as the price of gas has increased.
Secondary recovery is proven technology; indeed, a recent study indicates
that 50 percent of all domestic crude oil comes from secondary recovery
operations.
Water flooding is inherently more efficient than gas displacement in
pressure-maintenance projects and is the preferred process where feasible.
Cumulative recoveries by primary and secondary production, where the secondary
production is water flooding, average between 38 and 43 percent of the original oil
in place.
Some reservoirs, principally those containing heavy oil that flows only with
great difficulty, not only provide poor primary recovery but often are not
susceptible to water flooding.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 49
Enhanced oil recovery would be especially useful in some of these
reservoirs. Following figures show type of oil traps.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 50
Dr.G.G.Rajan 51
Dr.G.G.Rajan 52
Enhanced Recovery
Processes that inject fluids other than natural gas and water to augment a
reservoir’s ability to produce oil have been designated “improved,” “tertiary,” and
“enhanced” oil recovery processes.
The term used in this assessment is enhanced oil recovery (EOR).
According to American Petroleum Institute estimates of original oil in place
and ultimate recovery, approximately two-thirds of the oil discovered will remain
in an average reservoir after primary and secondary production. This inefficiency
of oil recovery processes has long been known and the knowledge has stimulated
laboratory and field testing of new processes for more than 50 years.
Early experiments with unconventional fluids to improve oil recovery
involved the use of steam (1920’s) and air for combustion to create heat.
Current EOR processes may be divided into four categories:
(a) thermal
(b) miscible
(c) chemical, and
(d) others.
Most EOR processes represent essentially untried, high-risk technology. One
thermal process has achieved moderately widespread commercialization. The
mechanisms of miscible processes are reasonably well understood, but it is still
difficult to predict whether they will work and be profitable in any given reservoir.
The chemical processes are the most technically complex, but they also could
produce the highest recovery efficiencies. The potential applicability of all EOR
processes is limited not only by technological constraints, but by economic,
material, and institutional constraints as well.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 53
Thermal Processes
Viscosity, a measure of a liquid’s ability to flow, varies widely among crude
oils. Some crudes flow like road tar, others as readily as water. High viscosity
makes oil difficult to recover with primary or secondary production methods.
The viscosity of most oils dramatically decreases as temperature increases,
and the purpose of all thermal oil-recovery processes is therefore to heat the oil to
make it flow or make it easier to drive with injected fluids. An injected fluid may
be steam or hot water (steam injection), or air (combustion processes).
Steam Injection. —Steam injection is the most advanced and most widely used
EOR process. It has been successfully used in some reservoirs in California since
the mid-1960’s. There are two versions of the process: cyclic steam injection and
steam drive.
In the first, high-pressure steam or steam and hot water is injected into a well
for a period of days or weeks. The injection is stopped and the reservoir is allowed
to “soak.” After a few days or weeks, the well is allowed to backflow to the
surface. Pressure in the producing well is allowed to decrease and some of the
water that condensed from steam during injection or that was injected as hot water
then vaporizes and drives heated oil toward the producing well.
When oil production has declined appreciably, the process is repeated.
Because of its cyclic nature, this process is occasionally referred to as the “huff and
puff” method.
The second method, steam drive or steam flooding, involves continuous
injection of steam or steam and hot water in much the same way that water is
injected in water flooding.
A reservoir or a portion thereof is developed with interlocking patterns of
injection and production wells. During this process, a series of zones develop as
the fluids move from injection well to producing well. Nearest the injection well is
Dr.G.G.Rajan 54
a steam zone, ahead of this is a zone of steam condensate (water), and in front of
the condensed water is a band or region of oil being moved by the water. The
steam and hot water zone together remove the oil and force it ahead of the water.
Cyclic steam injection is usually attempted in a reservoir before a full-scale
steam drive is initiated, partially as a means of determining the technical feasibility
of the process for a particular reservoir and partly to improve the efficiency of the
subsequent steam drive.
A steam drive, where applicable, will recover more oil than cyclic steam
injection and is one of the five EOR methods used in the study of the potential for
EOR processes. Illustrations of the operation of cyclic steam injection and steam
drive are given in figures 8 and 9, respectively.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 55
Combustiorn Processes.
Combustion projects are technologically complex, and difficult to predict
and control. Interest in the process has declined within the last 6 years relative to
other EOR processes. Active field tests declined from 30 in 1970 to 21 in 1976.
Eight of the projects have been termed successful, nine unsuccessful and four have
not yet been evaluated.
Injection of hot air will cause ignition of oil within a reservoir. Although
some oil is lost by burning, the hot combustion product gases move ahead of the
combustion zone to distill oil and push it toward producing wells. Air is injected
through one pattern of wells and oil is produced from another interlocking pattern
of wells in a manner similar to water flooding.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 56
This process is referred to as fire flooding, in situ (in place) combustion,
or forward combustion. Although originally conceived to apply to very viscous
crude oils not susceptible to water flooding, the method is theoretically applicable
to a relatively wide range of crude oils.
An important modification of forward combustion is the wet combustion
process. Much of the heat generated in forward combustion is left behind the
burning front. This heat was used to raise the temperature of the rock to the
temperature of the combustion. Some of this heat may be recovered by injection of
alternate slugs of water and air. The water is vaporized when it touches the hot
formation.
The vapor moves through the combustion zone heating the oil ahead of it
and assists the production of oil. With proper regulation of the proportion of water
and air, the combustion can proceed at a higher thermal efficiency than under
forward combustion without water injection.
Combustion processes compete, at least technologically, with steam and some
other EOR processes, and the choice depends upon oil and reservoir
characteristics.
The wet combustion process is illustrated in figure 10. It is the combustion
process selected for technical and economic modeling in this study.
Miscible Processes
Miscible processes are those in which an injected fluid dissolves in the oil it
contacts, forming a single oil-like liquid that can flow through the reservoir more
easily than the original crude.
A variety of such processes have been developed using different fluids that can
mix with oil, including alcohols, carbon dioxide, petroleum hydrocarbons such as

Dr.G.G.Rajan 57
propane or propane-butane mixtures, and petroleum gases rich in ethane, propane,
butane, and pentane.
The fluid must be carefully selected for each reservoir and type of crude to
ensure that the oil and injected fluid will mix. The cost of the injected fluid is quite
high in all known processes, and therefore either the process must include a
supplementary operation to recover expensive injected fluid, or the injected
material must be used sparingly.
In this process, a “slug,” which varies from 5 to 50 percent of the reservoir
volume, is pushed through the reservoir by gas, water (brine), or chemically treated
brine to contact and displace the mixture of fluid and oil.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 58
Miscible processes involve only moderately complex technology compared
with other EOR processes. Although many miscible fluids have been field tested,
much remains to be determined about the proper formulation of various chemical
systems to effect complete volubility and to maintain this volubility in the reservoir
as the solvent slug is pushed through it.
One large (50,000 acre) commercial project in Texas uses carbon dioxide
(C02) as the miscible agent, Eight other C02 projects covering 9,400 acres are. in
early stages of development.
Because of the high value of hydrocarbons and chemicals derived from
hydrocarbons, it is generally felt that such materials would not make desirable
injection fluids under current or future economic conditions.
For this reason, attention has turned to C02 as a solvent. Conditions for
complete mixing of C02 with crude oil depend on reservoir temperature and
pressure and on the chemical nature and density of the oil.
Although there are many possible CO2 sources, the largest source should be
naturally occurring deposits. Currently known sources of naturally occurring CO2
are described in publications of the U.S. Bureau of Mines. A summary of CO2
source locations is presented by the National petroleum Council, although the
actual amount of CO2 at these locations is unknown.
The potential demand for C02 is such that geological exploration is in
progress. A pictorial representation of a C02 miscible flood is shown in figure 11.
In the past, CO2 has sometimes, been injected into reservoirs in quantities and at
pressures less than those necessary to achieve complete miscibility, resulting in
less oil recovery than when complete mixing is achieved.
In this assessment, quantities and pressures of CO2 injected are designed to
achieve complete miscibility.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 59
Chemical Processes
Three EOR processes involve the use of chemicals —
o Surfactant/polymer
o Polymer and
o Alkaline flooding.
Surfactant/poIymer flooding, also known as micro emulsion flooding or micellar
flooding, is the newest and most complex of the EOR processes, While it has a
potential for superior oil recovery, few major field tests have been completed or
evaluated. Several major tests are now under way to determine its technical and
economic feasibility.
Surfactant/polymer flooding can be any one of several processes in which
detergent-like materials are injected as a slug of fluid to modify the chemical
interaction of oil with its surroundings.
These processes emulsify or otherwise dissolve or partly dissolve the oil
within the formation. Because of the cost of such agents, the volume of a slug can
represent only a small percentage of the reservoir volume.
To preserve the integrity of the slug as it moves through the reservoir, it is
pushed by water to which a polymer has been added. The surfactant/polymer
process is illustrated in figure 12.
The chemical composition of a slug and its size must be carefully selected
for each reservoir/ crude oil system. Not all parameters for this design process are
well understood.
Polymer Flooding. -Polymer flooding is a chemically augmented water flood in
which small concentrations of chemicals, such as poly acrylamides or
polysaccharides, are added toinjected water to increase the effectiveness of the

Dr.G.G.Rajan 60
water in displacing oil. The change in recovery effectiveness is achieved by several
different mechanisms, not all of which are completely understood.
Improvement in the efficiency of water flood recovery with the use of
polymers is relatively modest, but it is large enough for the process to be in limited
commercial use. If other EOR processes are technically possible they offer a
possibility of both greater oil recovery and greater economic return than polymer
flooding, although each reservoir must be evaluated individually to select the most
effective process. As it is currently in use, polymer flooding is evaluated in this
assessment.
Alkaline Flooding.—Water solutions of certain chemicals such as sodium
hydroxide, sodium silicate, and sodium carbonate are strongly alkaline. These
solutions will react with constituents present in some crude oils or present at the
rock/crude oil interface to form detergent-like materials which reduce the ability of
the formation to retain the oil. The few tests which have been reported are
technically encouraging, but the technology is not nearly so well developed as
those described previously.
Other EOR Processes
Over the years, many processes for improving oil recovery have been
developed, a large number of patents have been issued, and a significant number of
processes have been field tested. In evaluating a conceptual process, it should be
recognized that a single field test or patent represents but a small step toward
commercial use on a scale large enough to influence the Nation’s supply of crude
oil. Some known processes have very limited application, For example, if thin coal
beds lay under an oil reservoir this coal could be ignited, the oil above it would be
heated, its viscosity would be reduced, and it would be easier to recover. This
relationship between oil and coal is rare, however, and the process is not important
to total national energy production.
Dr.G.G.Rajan 61
Dr.G.G.Rajan 62
Environmental Effects
In general, the environmental impacts of EOR operations are not expected to
be significantly different in type or magnitude than those from primary and
secondary oil production activities. The major differences are air emissions from
thermal processes, and increases in consumption of fresh, or relatively fresh, water.
Thermal EOR processes produce atmospheric pollutants from the combustion of
large quantities of oil, either in steam generators (the steam injection process) or in
the reservoir itself (the in situ combustion process).
These types of emission are likely to have localized impacts and are
expected to be highly significant in areas that are already in violation of Federal
ambient air quality standards. Air quality standards are expected to limit expansion
of thermal processes unless effective emission control devices are used or
compensating reductions in emissions are made elsewhere in the affected area.
As noted in the discussion of resource constraints, EOR processes in general
required significant quantities of fresh, or relatively fresh, water, whereas
secondary water flooding can use saline water. This consumption of fresh water
not only will compete directly with domestic, agricultural, and other industrial
uses, but also could result in a drawdown of surface water, which could, in turn,
severely affect aquatic flora and fauna in the area of the drawdown. However, this
impact usually would be localized and of short duration.
The consumption of fresh water by EOR processes has the greatest potential
impact in oil producing localities , where water supplies are limited. Development
of EOR technologies to allow use of saline water could reduce this potential
problem.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 63
Conclusions:
Oil fields enhanced oil recovery (EOR) projects realizing in oil production
unit (OPU) is a risky activity. Primary sources of uncertainty of EOR projects are
geological (effective thickness of the productive stratum, current stratum pressure,
oil saturation, etc.), and as technology factors.
Other sources of uncertainty for OPU are financial and economic. It is
necessary to note, that though EOR costs are based on the cost price of made
production. Other economic contents are the costs directed on restoration of
serviceability of objects of development - are investment expenses. Hence,
expenses for EOR project should be considered as the investment project and to do
an estimation of economic efficiency of these costs according the formula of net
present value (NPVij):

Dr.G.G.Rajan 64
3.LOCALIZED (MICROSCOPIC) FLUID DISPLACEMENT IN
RESERVOIR
Introduction :
The injection of one fluid to displace another in a heterogeneous porous
medium is the basis of many industrial processes such as Enhanced Oil Recovery
(EOR) and the remediation of contaminated aquifers.
When the results are presented in scaled format, it is then possible to use the
data acquired on a given system (i.e. laboratory system) to predict the behavior of
another similar system, the one of actual interest, the prototype.
The evaluation follows a rigorous procedure of inspectional analysis to
derive the independent dimensionless scaling groups that describe immiscible
displacements in heterogeneous reservoirs with constant porosity and dip angle.
Fine-mesh numerical simulations are then performed in order to reveal the
functional relationships between the scaling groups describing the displacement
and the fractional oil recovery obtained from such displacement.
The results obtained from several well configurations will be presented,
which includes the use of several horizontal-vertical well combinations. These
relationships can be used as a quick prediction tool for the fractional oil recovery
for any combinations of the scaling groups, thus eliminating the need for the
expensive fine-mesh simulations. In addition, they provide the condition under
which a given well configuration may yield better recovery performance.
Process of fluid displacement
Oil remaining after primary and secondary recovery is the target of
Enhanced Oil Recovery -EOR. Therefore EOR methods are often referred to as
EOR Decision making – program

Dr.G.G.Rajan 65
tertiary recovery processes. Their use is not restricted to a particular phase in the
production life of a reservoir,
Injection of a displacing fluid may begin very early, long before the
complete depletion of the field by primary recovery. Most principles applied in
Enhanced Oil Recovery methods have been known for a long time. Numerous
laboratory studies and field pilots have been earned out, starting in the 1960s,
To prevent oil entrapment by capillary forces, we have to use a
displacing fluid that "is miscible with oil.
Miscibility is the ability of two or more, fluid substances (gases or liquids)
to form a single homogeneous phase when mixed in all proportions. For petroleum
reservoirs, miscibility is defined as that physical condition between two or more
fluids that permits them to mix in all proportions without the existence of an
interface, Miscibility hydrocarbon gas flooding acts mainly on the displacement
efficiency at the pore space scale, by annihilating the capillary forces.
Dynamic miscibility
In miscible flood processes some combination of transfer of components
from the oil displaced to the injected fluid to the oil takes plate as the phases flow
through the porous medium, When the required transfer is efficient enough, local
displacement efficiency can approach 100%.
Some hydrocarbon gases, with a high proportion of intermediate molecular
weight components (C3,C4,C5) are miscible with oil under pressure and
temperature conditions encountered in some oil reservoirs.
Moreover, under much wider condition the displacement of oil by
hydrocarbon gases may lead, through component exchange between oil and the
gas, to creation of transition zone in which the composition vanes continuously
between the composition of the displacing fluid and the composition of the oil .

Dr.G.G.Rajan 66
Injected fluids such as ethane, propane, butane or mixtures of Liquified
petroleum gas (LPG) mix directly with reservoir oil without any multi phase
behavior. developing a first contact miscibility process, It is a simplest way to
achieve miscibility , but solvents that gives this type of miscibility are expensive,
In other cases, the injected fluid such as methane, natural gas, carbon di
oxide or flue gas undergoes phase separation from the oil. Light to intermediate
components are exchanged between oil and injected fluid,
A transition zone spreads out in which both fluids are miscible. This type of
miscibility is called multiple contact miscibility or dynamic miscibility and
develops following processes-
- Vaporizing gas drive
- Condensing gas drive
A practical way to visualize the development of both processes is to draw a
tertiary phase diagram.
Vaporizing gas drive
Vaporizing gas drive is a particular case of multiple contact miscibility. It
is based on vaporization of intermediate components from the reservoir oil to
the injected gas creating a miscible transition zone. The C2-C3 fraction is
preferably extracted. This mainly occurs at high pressure by injecting natural gas,
hydrocarbons, flue gas or nitrogen,
Three poles of ternary diagram use defined as:
- light component , methane C1
- intermediate components, generally C2 to C6
- heavy components, for example C7+ heptanes and heavier fractions)
Under determined condition of pressure and temperature , (p and T), the dew
and bubble points are plotted inside the triangle, thus defining the two-phase zone
Point C is representative for the mixture of three pseudo components , which has
Dr.G.G.Rajan 67
T and p as critical temperature and pressure. The high-pressure gas injected gas is
represented by the point G, and the original oil by point O.
If miscibility is to develop, the representative point of oil should be on the

right side, and the point of the injected gases should be on the left side of the
critical tie line (i. e. the tangent to the phase envelop at point C). This implies that
oil is relatively rich on intermediate components,
Initially, virgin oil and injected gas are immiscible, and a representative line
GO passes through the two-phase zone. This implies that near the well bore some
residual oil with original composition O remains unchanged, As oil and gas are not
in equilibrium, thermodynamic exchange occurs, and the gas is enriched in
intermediate and heavy components.
Oil 01 generally occupies a smaller volume than oil O. gas g1 moves ahead,
chased by the fresh injected gas O, while the oil remains in place. At the step of the

Dr.G.G.Rajan 68
process, g1 contacts virgin oil O, and they are not in equilibrium so they divide
into two phase gas and oil.
On the other hand, oil and gas in contact with gas G gives oil Oa which is
even poorer in intermediate components. This whole process will go on until the
gas in contact with virgin oil reaches point gb, which is defined as the intercept of
the tangent to two-phase envelope from the oil representative point O. There, full
miscibility is achieved and no residual oil remains.
Behind the miscible bank, previously formed residual oils o1, 02 etc,,
continue becoming poorer in light fractions while in contact with fresh G. The
extreme composition of these residual oils is Op, placed on the tie line that passes
through G gas composition. This Op, oil does not exchange any intermediate
component with gas G. and will remain trapped in the reservoir.
Condensing gas drive
Until .1980, condensing gas drive was considered to be a well-known

phenomena which arises when rich gas is injected in to medium heavy oils. This
process is probably a dual vaporizing / condensing gas drive.. When a rich gas is
injected into a relatively heavy oil, oil and gas are initially immiscible, but a
miscible bank forms through condensation of intermediate components from gas
into oil. This implies that the injected gas is rich in intermediate hydrocarbons On
the other hand the oil to be recovered is relatively heavy (for a light oil, a lighter
gar i.e. poorer in intermediate components, it is sufficient and cheaper for
achieving miscibility). Representation of process is shows on a ternary diagram
{La t i 1, 1980}
- the representative point for gas: is G, is nearer to the C2- C6 pole than for
lean gas injection, and the representative point for oil O is close to the C7+ pole. It
is absolutely necessary for this type of miscibility to develop that the representative

Dr.G.G.Rajan 69
point for oil O has to be close to the left side of the critical tie line aid thai o!' the
Miivei,; is situated on the right side of this line.
Once injection starts, a classical immiscible displacement lakes place, since
the fluids are immiscible and virgin oil O is left behind the front in contact with
fresh gas G . A process similar to that described for vaporizing will develop. Oil
behind the front becomes progressively richer until it reaches O1 oil composition,
Gas in contact with virgin oil at the front becomes progressively drier, (G, g1,g2
etc.} and loses all its intermediate fractions until it reaches gp composition as
defined by the tie lone passing through point O. where it no longer exchanges
components with the oil,
The succsive oils O. o1, o2.,.,Oj formed behind the front occupy a greater
volume than the original oil because of swelling due to the intermediate fractions
solubilization. This will cause the mobilization of an oil bank with ot composition.
If the phase equilibria between oil and Gas are true two-phase liquid-vapor
equilibria i. e. no .solid phase is precipitated such as, for cxample asphaltenes and
heavy fraction, and no residual oil will be left in the reservoir, if condensing gas
drive occurs. Conversely, in vaporizing gas drive the resulting Op oil is
unrecoverable. The dry gas produced ahead of the bank is continuously dissolved
in the virgin oil that it contacts.
The rniscible displacement rnechanism yields significantly high recovery
The high efficiency is a result of displacing essentially all of the oil in the area
contacted except for die by-passed islands of oil which are large compared to a
pore space.
Even this bypassed oil continue to flow, as long as it is surrounded by
material miscible with it.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 70
Figure 1. A Modern Oil-Recovery Project
This illustration of a modern oil-recovery project shows both production
wells (black arrows indicate hydrocarbons) and injection wells (blue arrows
indicate water) drilled into oil-bearing strata deep beneath the Earth’s surface. The
enlargement at left shows the porous network in the oil-bearing rock. Water (blue)
that has been injected under pressure into the reservoir is displacing oil (black).
The regular planar grid between the surface and the reservoir represents in two
dimensions the rectangular-block geometry used in bulk flow simulations of
reservoir performance. Plotted on the grid are lines of constant altitude in the top
layer of the reservoir, which is not parallel to the surface but rather has hills and
valleys. Bulk-flow simulations of reservoir-flow performance are an important
ingredient in the decision of whether to invest in major recovery projects.
Improved prediction of bulk-flow parameters through understanding the physics at
the pore scale is the goal of the lattice-Boltzmann simulations of multiphase flow
through porous media.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 71
In today’s world oil market, economic production of oil and gas resources requires
carefully engineered recovery projects of increasing technical complexity and
sophistication. Hydrocarbons do not reside in cavernous pools awaiting discovery.
Rather they are found
—sometimes at enormous depths—within the confines of tiny pores in rock.
Although the pores may be interconnected, the resulting pathways still present a
significant resistance to the flow of oil toward a well drilled into the hydrocarbon-
bearing strata.
In addition, since water resides in some of the pores, hydrocarbons and water are
recovered simultaneously at the well-head. Thus, even when large amounts of oil
are known to be in a reservoir, often only a relatively small fraction of it can be
recovered with conventional pumping technology. The most common method of
enhancing oil recovery, which accounts for much of the oil production is the
injection of water at strategic locations to displace the oil toward the production
wells.
Modern recovery projects of the type depicted in Figure 1 require very large capital
investments. A single off-shore well drilled to a depth of 15,000 feet can cost up to
$100 million. To be successful, a project must have a sizable hydrocarbon target,
the promise of extracting oil or gas at a sufficiently high rate, a strategy for water
separation and disposal, and a scheme for transportation to a refinery.
As exploration efforts are driven to more remote environments, the infrastructure
costs for hydrocarbon production escalate. Large potential returns are inevitably
accompanied by large monetary risk.
Obviously, economic analysis must be performed before deciding whether a
particular investment should be made. Computer simulations of reservoir flow
performance are one of the essential ingredients in the analysis. On the basis of
both field and laboratory data about the distributions of different rock types and the
Dr.G.G.Rajan 72
properties of each type, we attempt to predict the average, or bulk, flow behavior
of the fluids through the hydrocarbon-bearing rock of a reservoir.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 73
Edge flooding is used for comparatively small oil pools with injection wells
located 100 to 200 m or more away from the oil-water contact (see Fig. 6.1).
Marginal flooding is used for oil fields where the water bearing parts of the
reservoirs have a low permeability. Injection wells are sunk a very short distance
away from the oil-pool outline or placed directly along it.
Contour flooding is practicable for large fields. Rows of injection wells divide a
field into individual producing formations to be further exploited as isolated
reservoirs. Injection wells are driven mainly into high-permeability regions, with
consideration for the geologic structure of the beds.
The reservoir energy sources for edge areas of the field are the edge water drive
and the water drive provided both by the rows of injection wells drilled in at a
small distance from the oil-pool outline, and by the rows of injection wells drilled
into oil-saturated portions. The latter intra-contour injection wells also serve as
energy supply sources for other individual oil-bearing sections of the oil field.
Contour flooding can considerably raise the rates of oil recovery and reduce the
field development period. The reason for this is that only two or three rows of oil
wells can simultaneously be kept in production. Should a larger number of rows of
wells be set into operation at the same time, the energy of bottom waters or the
energy of the gas cap would go entirely into pushing oil toward the first two or
three rows of wells.
The other rows of wells disposed inside the oil-pool outline would produce at the
expense of the elastic compression energy of productive stratum rocks and the
expansion energy of oil and oil-dissolved gas. The solution-gas drive that ensues is
to be avoided because it results in an irrational expenditure of reservoir energy. To
pre¬vent the production of internal regions of the reservoir would require a long-
term conservation of its central zones, for tens of years.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 74
A few contour flooding techniques are now in use that differ in the patterns
of spacing of water injection wells, the sequences in which they are brought into
service, procedures and rates o.r pumping wafer into the beds, and the recoveries
of oil from producing wells.
Figure 6.2a illustrates contour flooding with the rows of water injection wells that
divide the oil pool into individual development areas. Fig. 6.2b demonstrates block
contour flooding where transverse rows of injection wells divide the oil pool into
blocks, each enclosing an odd number of producing wells.
The productive areas and blocks of the oil pool .are usually 4 to 5 km wide
or even less if the formations have a decreased permeability and contain oil of low
viscosity.
The pattern of injection wells is drawn up beforehand, taking into
consideration the geologic structure of oil pools, or else the rows of wells are

Dr.G.G.Rajan 75
driven into high permeability portions of the formation along the lines of the
strongest water encroachment (water breakthrough). These lines of water inrush
usually become apparent in the process of oil-pool development.
In high permeability zones the first row of producing wells goes to water
rapidly, followed by the second and third. The same character of water
encroachment is in evidence on the opposite side of the pool. The drowned wells
are then shifted to the category of injection wells.
New injection wells are drilled along the same line, if necessary. It is as if
the water itself laid its course, separating one production area from the other. In
block contour flooding the lines of injection wells usually extend across the trend
of effective areas, the line pattern being chosen with consideration for the geologic
structure of the productive strata.
Selective flooding. To effect this type of flooding (Fig. 6.2c), a specified number
of uniformly spaced wells are first driven over the area. Next, after performing. the
detailed correlation of oil basin profiles and hydrodynarnic surveys, the entire
stock of drilled wells is subjected to close scrutiny. Then wells are chosen for
injecting water into the formation.
To make the right choice, one must ensure that the injection wells have a
high intake capacity and maintain the desired pressure in adjacent wells, being
careful to make sure that the spacing between the injection wells and their
disposition over Iho area ho such that they do not interfere with one another.
Contour water flood oil pool development may additionally require spot
flooding if the reservoir pressure in some individual sections falls off causing oil
recovery rates to decline. Spot flooding is put into effect by converting some
producing wells into injection wells, which are chosen in the same manner used in
selective flooding. One of the basic prerequisites here is to site injection wells in
Dr.G.G.Rajan 76
the center of the area in such a way that the injected water can exert a uniform
action on the surrounding oil wells.
Some stimulation methods use gas or air injected into formations to intensify
oil production and raise ultimate recoveries. The factors that favor the injection of
gas are large bed slope angles and low oil viscosities. Methods for maintaining the
reservoir pressure by gas injection are now less commonly used since they require
gas sources and high-pressure compressors of enhanced flow rates.
Fig 6.3 . Oil field production performance

Dr.G.G.Rajan 77
Dr.G.G.Rajan 78
4.MACROSCOPIC FLUID DISPLACEMENT IN RESERVOIR
Reservoir fluid PVT properties and rock properties.

PVT properties of Reservoir fluid indicates the relationship between
pressure and temperature of the reservoir fluids, essentially Crude oil. This is of
utmost importance for successful crude oil production.
This study determines the changes in pressure-volume-temperature (PVT)
properties caused by gas injection / steam injection or other recovery processes
applied in reservoirs.
This study uses the equation-of-state models for compositional simulation
and establishes a means for predicting fluid properties in all areas of the field.
The study characterizes reservoir fluids for compositional simulation and
shows whether the crude is paraffinic, naphthenic or intermediate type. PVT
properties change with gas injection rates and production.
The study applies a Peng-Robinson equation of state (EOS)-based PVT
program on the PVT data from samples collected from various wells before gas
injection. A regression technique with dynamic parameter selection tuned the EOS
to match these PVT data, after which the tuned Peng-Robinson EOS determined
the PVT data from the wells sampled after gas injection. Generated results
compared well with laboratory data.
Typical example of PVT analysis - Iran oil production
Iran has about 90 billion bbl of proved oil reserves, or roughly 9% of the
world’s total. The majority of Iran’s crude oil reserves are in giant onshore fields in
the Khuzestan region near the Iraqi border and Persian Gulf terminus. More than
half of Iran’s 40 producing fields contain more than 1 billion bbl of oil. The
onshore Ahwaz, Marun, Gachsaran, Agha Jari, and Bibi Hakimeh fields account

Dr.G.G.Rajan 79
for about two-thirds of Iran’s oil production. Most or Iran’s crude oil is low in
sulfur, with gravities in the 30°-39° API range.
Iran’s onshore field development work is concentrated mainly on sustaining
output levels from large, aging fields. Consequently, enhanced oil recovery (EOR)
programs, including gas injection, are under way in a number of fields, including
Marun.1
Marun field
Marun field is in the central part of the Dezful embayment, a tectonically
depressed area having the majority of Iran’s oil fields. Reservoirs include
fractured and porous carbonates and sandstones of the Asmari formation of
Oligocene and Miocene age and the carbonates of the Cretaceous Bangestan
group.
The field is a layered fractured limestone and sandstone reservoir.
Exploration in the field started in 1963 with production starting in 1966.
Production rose gradually and in 1972 exceeded 1 million b/d. Later, due to
difficulties production fell and in recent years is about 500,000 b/d. Table 1
summarizes the field’s characteristics.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 80
Above analysis shows the reservoir temperature at 11000 ft depth is 218 oF and the
gas oil ratio is about 900 SCF of gas / stb of crude oil. This shows that the reservoir
has tremendous gas dissolved in the oil and needs a gas processing plant to handle
gas from both fields. Part of the gas may be used in power plants to generate power
as per the requirement.
Laboratory PVT data
The fluid samples, collected from various wells before start up of
production, after production and before gas injection gives a wealth of information.
Information on the PVT reports generally includes:
• API gravity, density, and molecular weigh to C7+.
• Bubble point pressure at different temperatures.
• Constant composition expansion (CCE) data.
• Differential liberation data.
Following figures show the utility of PVT relationship of Crude oil behavior at the
reservoir conditions.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 81
Changes in PVT properties
After gas injection, well samples may be collected and PVT experiments
may be conducted on them.
Figs. 2a, 2b, and 2c show the difference in PVT data before and after gas injection.
For a well below the saturation pressure, the oil formation volume
factor, Bo, after gas injection started is greater than the Bo before gas
injection. Above the saturation pressure the Bo after gas injection is less than
the Bo before gas injection.
Changes of oil specific gravity, o, due to gas injection are inverse of changes
of Bo. Solution gas ratio, Rs, below saturation pressure remains unchanged but
above the saturation pressure, the Rs after gas injection is less than the Rs before
gas injection.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 82
Dr.G.G.Rajan 83
An adequate knowledge of any reservoir fluid PVT properties is essential
for most types of petroleum calculations.
These calculations include
Amount of oil in the reservoir
Production capacity
Variations in produced gas-oil ratio during the reservoir's production life
Calculation of recovery efficiency
Reservoir performance
Production operations and the design of production facilities.
PVT properties can be measured experimentally by using collected bottom-
hole or surface samples of crude oils. But, the experimental determination of PVT
is time consuming and very costly. In addition, even with the availability of PVT

Dr.G.G.Rajan 84
analyses, it is often necessary to extrapolate the data to field and/or surface
conditions through the use of empirical correlations.
Furthermore, geological and geographical conditions are considered very
critical in the development of any correlation. But, universal correlations are
difficult to develop. That is why correlations for local regions, where crude
properties are expected to be uniform, is a reasonable alternative. In the study,
experimental PVT data for crudes, statistical and artificial neural network (ANN)
analyses are used to develop reliable PVT correlations. Comparisons with
previously published correlations may be developed..
Definitions :

Dr.G.G.Rajan 85
Dr.G.G.Rajan 86
Material Balance :
In petroleum technology, material balance refers to the total material
produced and received. A schematic diagram may be somewhat as shown below.
Typical material balance

No Input Output
1 Crude quantity produced t/hr
2 Water produced t/hr
3 Net Gas export t/hr
4 Reinjection gas t/hr
5 Crude output t/hr
6 Condensate t/hr
7 Losses / flaring t/hr
8 Total

Dr.G.G.Rajan 87
Note : Material input and output should tally in any facility. Any abnormal
deviation indicates some serious problem.
Mobility ratio:
The mobility ratio is defined as the ratio of the permeability to the flow of
the liquid to the dynamic viscosity of that liquid. The oil and water mobility ratios
are given as below.
For maximum efficiency, the mobility ratio of the driving fluid should be less than
the mobility ratio for the driven fluid. If the mobility ratio of the driving fluid is
greater than the mobility ratio of the driven fluid, the driving fluid will tend to
channel or finger through the hydrocarbon, tending to bypass the hydrocarbon in
the smaller permeability channels leaving it behind in the reservoir. Typically, the
water mobility ratio is greater than the oil mobility ratio.
Displacement efficiency:
Displacement efficiency is defined as the volume of fluid displaced to the
volume of fluid injected. The injecting fluid may be a gas or liquid.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 88
Not all the injected water will displace the same volume of crude oil in the
reservoir as the flow to the oil section depends on the permeability of the structure
as shown above. It is likely that some quantity of injected water may bypass the oil
well. It is possible to evaluate displacement efficiency of a producing well by the
simple relationship
Quantity of oil produced / Quantity of injected water.
This assumes the well pressure, temperature are constant. In the second stage
of production, where the well pressure starts dropping down, it is possible to
estimate the displacement efficiency from PVT relation ship. Look at the fig shown
below, which represents a typical well. If the base reservoir pressure is P1 and the
Volume of Gas above the crude layer is V1 and after certain period, the pressure
drops to P2, then the volume occupied by gas layer may be expressed by the
simple gas law
P1 V1 = P2 V2 ( Here compressibility factor and temperature are assumed

constant ).
V2 = (P1/P2)* V1

Dr.G.G.Rajan 89
Suppose Vw is the volume of water injected to bring the reservoir pressure
to P1, then the displacement efficiency is taken as total production of crude
divided by the quantity of injected water. Production data is required to calculate
the displacement efficiency accurately.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 90
Sweep efficiency :
Though this is similar to displacement efficiency, this is a measure of

effectiveness of injection systems employed, especially during EOR stage. Figure
given below is self explanatory.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 91
NATURAL RESERVOIRS OF OIL AND GAS
Rocks forming the earth's crust are traditionally divided into three groups
according to their origin — igneous, sedimentary and metamorphic.
Igneous rocks were formed as the result of the cooling and solidifying of
molten magma erupted from the earth's interior. The rocks of this type are thought
to make up about 95 % of the outermost crust of the earth. They are generally
hard, crystalline in structure, and are practically devoid of pore space, or
voids. In this group belong granite, basalt, syenite, andesite, serpentines, diabases,
gabbro-diabases, and others.
Sedimentary rocks were formed from the deposition of organic and
inorganic matter. Fine pieces of igneous rock along with plant and animal fossils
were deposited by wind or water and gradually settled in layers and strata.
Sedimentary rocks are grouped into three categories:
o clastic
o Chemical, and
o Organic sediments.
Clastic sediments were formed by the breakdown, transport, and
deposition of rocks. These are gravels, conglomerates, breccia, sands, sandstones,
silts, siltstones, clay, clay stone, and shale.
Chemical sediments were formed by precipitation in the course of chemical
processes. Their composition includes mineral substances that were deposited at
the place of bedding, but unlike sand grains they were not transported by water.
Chemical sediments are mineral salts (chlorides, sulfates, and others), carbonates
(limestone, dolomites, and others), and siliceous rocks. These rocks generally
have a crystalline structure.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 92
In the category of organic sediments belong those rocks formed from the
products of a life process, either animal or vegetable (limestones, jasper,
phosphorites, coals, and others). Characteristic of these rocks is the so-called
slime structure where organic fragments are predominant.
The most common sedimentary rocks are sands, sandstones, limestones,
and claystones. Tectonic processes which occur in a high-pressure high-
temperature environment change the composition and structure of original
igneous and sedimentary rocks and cause the formation of metamorphic rocks. The
most common of such rocks include quartzites, slates, gneisses, marble, and
amphiboles. Metamorphic rocks do not contain fossils. They resemble igneous
rocks in their crystalline-grain structure and sedimentary rocks in the parallel-
linear distribution of mineral grains. The main distinction of metamorphic rocks is
their schistosity (foliated structure), i. e. the property of rocks to cleave into flat
thin plates.
Commercial crude oil and gas reserves are found mainly in sedimentary
rocks (sands, sandstones, limestone, and conglomerates). In igneous and
metamorphic rocks oil occurs rarely and, as a rule, has no commercial
significance.
Natural accumulations of oil and gas in the earth's interior are called oil
and gas reservoirs, or pools. If a rock bed contains both oil and gas in a free state,
the reservoir is called an oil-and-gas pool.
An oil-bearing bed (also termed a formation) is usually bound at the top
and the bottom by impermeable rocks (clays) that do not allow oil and gas to
penetrate into other strata. The thickness of oil and gas strata varies from a
few centimeters to a few hundreds of meters and

Dr.G.G.Rajan 93
Fig. 1.1. Modes of occurrence (reservoir configurations)
can vary from one to a few tens, so the fields can be of the single-horizon (single-
layer) or multi horizon (multilayer) types.
By their mode of occurrence, oil and gas pools are divided into sheet and
massive accumulations, and also into lithologically, tectonically, and
stratigraphically screened reservoirs (Fig. 1.1).
The most common sheet oil pools are roof deposits located in the roof
areas of anticlinal structures (Fig. l.la). Massive oil pools are formed in thick
strata (sometimes differing in age and composition) and are under laid with water.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 94
Lithologically screened pools generally occur in impermeable strata having local
permeable lenses and cavernous areas (Fig. 1.1b). Tectonically screened pools are
found at the flanks of anticlines and monoclines and are bound up-dip by tectonic
dislocations (Fig. 1c) or stratigraphic unconformities (Fig. 1d).

Dr.G.G.Rajan 95
PHYSICAL PROPERTIES OF ROCKS
The characteristics and properties that describe the rocks making up
productive strata (pay-out beds, or producing formations) are the following:
Porosity
Granulo metric composition
Permeability
Specific surface
Elasticity
Resistance to rupture, compression and to other kinds of deformation
Saturation by oil, gas, and water, and
Interaction with fluids (molecular surface properties).
These characteristics and properties determine the conditions of oil-field
development.
POROSITY
Porosity is the property of a rock to contain voids (pores, caverns, fissures).
It thus determines the ability of a rock to hold oil, gas, and water. Porosity is
defined by the absolute (total) porosity factor, or ratio
mt = V/Vo: (2.1)
where
V is the total volume of pores in a sample; and Vo is the total sample
volume.
The porosity factor is expressed in decimal fractions or as a percent:
m,=( V/Vo) x 100 (2.2)
The pore volume and the porosity factor depend on a number of factors,
such as the shape, size, and mutual distribution of grains and particles forming a
rock, and also the content of a cementing material (matrix) in the rock.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 96
If the grains of a rock differ in shape and size, the porosity factor of such a
rock is low since the spaces (interstices) between large grains are found to be filled
with fine grains. The porosity factor of rocks composed of grains showing the
uniformity of size, regular spherical shape, and equidistant arrangement is
independent of their grain size. For such rocks the porosity factor varies from
0.26 to 0.48.
The properties of rocks are heavily dependent on the dimensions of pore
channels, both capillary and subcapillary. It is customary to relate to the first type
of pore channels the pores with a diameter from 0.000 2 to 0.5 mm, and to the
second type the pores less than 0.0002mm in diameter. In the ordinary natural
conditions of pressure differentials, the motion of fluid in subcapillary pores does
not occur. What explains this fact is that since the distance between pore channel
walls is small, the fluid experiences the molecular attraction of the walls and is
firmly held within the pores. The range of porosity of some rocks is given in Table
2.1.
Table 2.1. Porosity factor of Rocks
As seen from the table, both clays, sands, and sandstones can display the
same porosity. However, clays are impermeable since they generally have
subcapillary pore channels. In contrast to this, sands and sandstones feature high
permeability due to their large capillary channels.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 97
As the depth of bedding (occurrence depth) grows, the porosity of rocks
commonly decreases as the result of compaction caused by the pressure of
overlying rocks. Carbonate rocks are most non uniform in porosity since they
contain dense slabs virtually free of pores, along with fissured and cavernous
blocks.
A liquid or gas is immobile in closed and blind pores. For this reason,
apart from the total porosity factor, an open porosity factor is introduced to
describe oil-bearing rocks:
M == Vop/Vo (2 3)
where Vop is the volume of open pores letting fluids pass through; and Vo is
the total sample volume. The porosity factor is estimated in laboratory conditions
by various tests on core samples extracted from the well as it is being driven.
GRANULOMETRIC COMPOSITION
The granulometric composition of a rock defines the quantitative distribution
of grains differing in size that make up the given rock. A number of rock properties
depend on the grain-size composition, such as the porosity, permeability, specific
surface of a porous medium, and also capillary properties. As noted earlier, the
rocks composed of non uniform grains have a lower porosity and poorer
permeability. The grain-size composition thus determines the total surface of a
porous medium that makes contact with oil. It is also responsible for the quantity
of un recovered oil in the form of thin films left in the pores of the bed after
abandoning the oil field.
The granulometric composition is estimated by screen (mesh) analysis and
sedimentation analysis.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 98
The screen test is made with the aid of a stack of wire or silk gage sieves
arranged one under the other in order of decreasing mesh sizes — from 3.36 mm
for the upper sieve to 0.053 mm for the lower most sieve (the mesh size here is the
length of the side of a square opening). A 50-gram sample of loose rock is poured
on to the upper sieve and screened through the entire set of sieves for 15min. The
residue of particles caught on each sieve is then weighed to determine the grain
fineness of each fraction.
Sedimentation analysis involves the estimation of the rate at which non uniform
sand grains settle to the bottom in a viscous liquid. The results of the screen and
sedimentation tests are then used to plot the graph of the total granulometric
composition ( fig 2.1). For this, the mass concentrations of grains in percent are
Dr.G.G.Rajan 99
laid off along the y axis and the logarithm of the particle diameter (log d ) along
the x axis. The grain heterogeneity coefficient for rocks of oil and gas deposits
usually varies from 1.1 to 20.0.
PERMEABILITY
Permeability is the capacity of rocks to transmit fluids. The permeability of rocks

is defined by the permeability coefficient determined from the Darcy linear
filtration law. By this law, the filtration rate of f l u i d in a porous medium is in
direct proportion to the differential pressure and in inverse proportion to the
fluid viscosity:
υ = (k / µ) (∆p/∆L.) (2.4)
where v is the linear filtration rate; k is the proportionality factor, known as the
permeability coefficient; µ is the dynamic viscosity of the fluid; ∆p is the
pressure difference between two points in a specimen over a length ∆L in the
direction of fluid flow. Substituting v = Q/F into formula (2.4) and solving it for
k
gives
k = Q * µ * ∆L. / (F * ∆p ) (2.5)
where Q is the volumetric rate of fluid flow through a specimen; and F is the
cross-sectional area of the specimen.
By formula (2.5) the estimates of k are made using the results of laboratory
tests.
The dimension of the quantity k in the International System of Units (SI) is
area, the unit of measure being the square meter (m 2 ). This unit is derived from
the substitution of the units of L(m), ^(rn 2 ), Q(m 3 /s), p(Pa), and jx (Pa s)
into formula (2.5):

Dr.G.G.Rajan 100
m3/s 2X Pas X m _ m 2
m X Pa ~
Thus the SI unit of permeability (m2) is taken to be the permeability of a

porous specimen 1 m2 in cross section and 1 m in length that permits the flow of a
liquid having a viscosity of 1 Pas under the pressure difference of 1 Pa at a rate of
1 m3/s. The physical meaning of the dimension area chosen for k is such that the
permeability defines, as it were, the magnitude of the cross-sectional area of
channels which primarily account for the filtration of fluids through rocks.
The permeability of natural oil reservoirs varies (on the average from 0.1
to 2 m2) over a wide range even in one and the same bed. Clays and clay rocks are
practically impermeable. The rock permeability of a formation along its strike is
higher than that across the bedding. This is because rocks are more compact in the
direction normal to stratification.
In oil and gas fields under development, the porous medium simultaneously
transmits oil, gas, water, or oil-gas-water mixtures. The permeability of the same
porous medium for one phase (a liquid or gas) varies here with the quantitative and
the qualitative composition of phases comprising a mixture. For this reason the
concepts of absolute (normal), effective (phase), and relative permeabilities are
introduced to more comprehensively describe the filtration properties of oil-
bearing rocks.
Absolute permeability is a measure of the ability of a porous medium to
transmit only one of the phases (a gas or liquid). It should be noted that there is no
physicochemical interaction between the porous medium and the one-phase fluid.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 101
Effective permeability is the permeability of a porous medium only for a
liquid or gas during a simultaneous filtration of multiphase systems. This type of
permeability depends on the physicochemical properties of both the porous
medium and each phase taken separately, the percentage of phases in the system,
and the actual pressure gradients.
Relative permeability is the ratio between the effective and the absolute
permeability.
Figure 2.2 shows the curves of relative permeability of sand to water (kw)
and oil (k0) as a function of water saturation of the pore space. As seen from the
graphs, at a water saturation of over 20 % the effective permeability of rock for oil
drops off sharply, though the reservoir still yields pure (water-free) oil under the
formation pressure gradients. What accounts for this is that the molecular surface
tension forces hold the water in the form of thin films in the fine pores and at the
surface of sand grains, thus decreasing the cross-sectional area of filtration
channels. As the water saturation level reaches 80 %, oil stops filtering out, though
the bed still contains a certain amount of oil. It is obviously impermissible to
tolerate the premature water encroachment of pay horizons and the influx of water
into bottom-hole formation zones when tapping oil pools and carrying out
subsurface repairs.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 102
SPECIFIC SURFACE
The Specific surface of a rock is the total surface area of particles
per unit volume of the rock specimen. Because individual grains are small in
size and the compactness of a grain arrangement is high, the pore space of a rock
can have a huge total surface area. Thus, the surface area of regular spherical-
shaped grains 0.2 mm in size contained in 1 m3 of homogeneous sand amounts to
20 276 m2.
The specific surface of oil-bearing rocks determines their permeability,
interstitial (connate) water content, adsorptivity, and other properties. If the porous
medium shows a large specific surface, the number of surface molecules of a liquid
becomes high and can be compared to the number of molecules in the bulk. That is

Dr.G.G.Rajan 103
why the molecular surface phenomena in a low-permeability rock can exert a much
stronger effect on liquid filtration than is the case for high-permeability rocks.
The specific area of the filtration surface, Ssp (m2/m3), of oil-bearing rocks
can be estimated to an accuracy sufficient for practical purposes from the
approximation formula
Ssp = 7000m √W / √k (2-7)
where m is the porosity, in decimal fractions; and k is the permeability, in m2.
The specific surface of oil-bearing rocks in commercial oil fields varies over
a wide range, from 40 000 to 230 000 m2/m3.
Rocks having a specific surface of over 230 000 m2/m3 are either
impermeable or weakly permeable. They are formed from clays, clayey sands,
clay shales, and other low-permeability materials.
RESERVOIR PROPERTIES OF FISSURED ROCKS
The reservoir properties of formations in many oil deposits largely depend

not only on inter granular porosity but also on the quantity of extended (deep)
fractures, or fissures. Oil accumulations in fissured (fractured) reservoirs are most
often confined to dense carbonate rocks and sometimes, to terrigenous deposits
which are unable to efficiently transmit fluids if they lack fractures.
The quality of fissured rocks as an oil or gas reservoir is defined by the
opening, number, and density of fractures.
The density of fractures at any site of the bed is described by the volume
density of fractions:
T = ∆S / ∆T (2.8)
where ∆S is half the surface area of all fractures in a unit volume of rock
∆V.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 104
The fracture porosity mf is defined as the ratio between the fracture volume
and the volume of a rock specimen:
mf = h ∆S/∆F = hT (2.9)
where h is the height of fracture opening, mm.
The permeability coefficient kf for a fissured rock is given by
kf = 85 000 h2mf (2.10)
As seen from formula (2.10), the fracture permeability of rock is very high.
Thus, at h = 0.1 mm and m/ = 0.01, we have kf = 8.5 µm2.
The porosity and permeability of fissured rocks are determined from the
analysis of thin rock sections, measurements of the fracture volume, done by
saturating the cores with fluids, the results of field research and well logging, and
also the data on flow rates taken from downhole flowmeters and flow recorders.
MECHANICAL PROPERTIES
Many processes occurring in a formation in the course of its exposing and

production are dependent on the mechanical properties of rocks, such as the
elasticity, strength in compression and rupture, and plasticity.
As is well-known, a decrease in formation (reservoir) pressure causes a
reduction of the pore space. This is due to the elastic mineral grain extension and
rock skeleton compaction under the action of the mass of overlying rocks. As a
result, the fluid starts flowing out of the pores. The elastic properties of rocks, i. e.
their ability to vary in pore volume with pressure, have an effect on pressure
redistribution in the process of oil production.
The elastic properties of rock are judged by the formation compressibility
factor. An external compression pressure applied to a rock specimen contracts it
and thus reduces its pore space. Releasing the pressure restores the original volume

Dr.G.G.Rajan 105
and porosity of the specimen without producing a permanent deformation or set if
the stresses are below the elastic limit.
The elastic change in the pore volume of most rocks follows Hooke's law
∆V/Vo = β ∆P, β =( ∆V/ Vo ∆P ) (2.11)
where ∆V is the variation of pore volume, in m3, with a pressure variation
by ∆P, Pa; and β is the cubic elasticity ratio of rock, I/Pa,
As seen from formula (2.11), the ratio β describes a relative change in the
pore space volume with a pressure change by 1 Pa.
According to laboratory tests, the cubic elasticity ratio of oil-bearing rocks
varies from 0.3 X 10-4 to 2 X 10-4 1/MPa.
Rock strength is the resistance of rock to mechanical destruction. Rocks
offer considerable resistance to compression, but the strength of rocks in tension,
bending, and shear comes to merely tenths and hundredths of the strength in
compression. The strength of limestone decreases with an increased content of clay
particles. Sandstones cemented with lime (calcareous sandstones) show the lowest
strength in compression.
The compression strength of rocks grows with their density. The strength of
limestone and sandstone decreases by 20-45 % after water saturation.
The plastic properties of rocks, i. e. their ability to deform under high
pressure without the development of cracks or noticeable disturbances in structure,
show up in deep-well drilling. At a considerable depth, a firm rock can "run" out
into the bore hole under the high pressure of overlying rock strata.
Folding in the earth's crust, which leads to smooth bends, flexures,
concavities, and bulges, is also dependent on the plastic properties of rock.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 106
OCCURRENCE OF OIL, GAS, AND WATER IN RESERVOIRS
In reservoirs oil, gas, and gas-oil mixtures can occur in a liquid, gaseous, or
multiphase state, depending on the content, composition, pressure, and temperature
of each phase.
If the gas content of an oil pool is considerable, the gas can accumulate in
the form of a gas cap in the elevated section of the stratum, and a portion of liquid
hydrocarbons that evaporate
under temperature will replenish the gas cap. At a high reservoir pressure, the gas
density becomes rather high and approaches the density of highly volatile
hydrocarbon liquids. Under these conditions, a large amount of oil dissolves in
compressed gas in much the same way that oil and heavy bitumens dissolve in
gasoline or in other liquid hydrocarbons. If the volume of gas in the reservoir is
small in comparison with that of oil, and the pressure is rather high, the gas
completely dissolves in oil and the gas-oil reservoir occurs in a single-phase
(liquid) state.
By the mode of occurrence of oil and gas and their volumetric
proportions, reservoirs are divided into oil, gas, gas-and-oil (with a large gas cap
and oil fringe), and gas-condensate reservoirs.
Figure 2.3 schematically depicts a multilayer anticlinal oil-gas deposit. In
this oil-and-gas field, bed A is a purely gas-bearing stratum, and beds B and C are
oil strata. The upper part of bed B is filled with gas. The lower parts of all beds
with strata are under laid waters.
Oil, gas, and water are distributed in a bed according to their densities:
gas occupies an upper part, oil a lower part, with water underlying oil. Water

Dr.G.G.Rajan 107
portions of beds are, as a rule, tens or hundreds of times larger than gas-and-
oil portions, and extend over the area for great distances.
Oil- and gas-saturated portions of reservoirs also contain water in the
form of thin films held by capillary forces on the walls of the thinnest pores
and subcapillary cracks. Its chemical composition is identical to that of bottom
(underlying) or edge waters. This capillary and film water left unswept from beds
during the formation of oil and gas reservoirs is called interstitial or connate
water.
Interstitial water is immobile even at substantial pressure gradients. That is
why producing wells can yield pure oil, even if the reservoir contains a large
amount of interstitial water. The interstitial water content of oil fields ranges
from 10 to 30 % of the total volume of pore space. However, there are deposits,
mainly gas fields, with low-permeability clay strata where the content of interstitial
water can reach even 70 %. The thickness of thin layers of interstitial water is
found to depend on the permeability of a reservoir, its nature, and the salinity of
water itself. The thickness of thin films decreases with increasing water salinity
and grows with clayiness.
It is important to take into account interstitial water content in estimating
crude oil and gas reserves. Where the content of this water is large, the effective
permeability of the producing horizon to hydrocarbons lowers, and wells produce
at lesser rates. If water supply sources employed for the flooding of beds are
chosen incorrectly, the injected water may interact with interstitial water to form
sediments of mineral salts which partially or completely plug up the pore space of
the formation. The properties of interstitial water are examined so as to choose a
proper clay drilling mud in tapping the pay horizon.
A knowledge of interstitial water properties is useful in solving the problems
of origin of oil and gas fields.
Dr.G.G.Rajan 108
Since oil and gas reservoirs differ in porosity and permeability and since
water in pores is liable to ascend on account of capillary lift, there is no clear-cut
separation between the water-and oil-bearing parts of the reservoir. The water
content gradually varies along the vertical from 100 % in the water-bearing portion
to fractions of a percent (residual water saturation) in the elevated part of the pool.
This part of the producing formation is known as a transition zone, whose
thickness can reach 3 to 5 m depending on the clayiness and permeability of the
reservoir.
The estimates of oil and gas reserves are therefore made with due
consideration for the transition zone thickness proceeding from the porosity
and permeability of reservoirs.
The fluids contained within a pool experience formation (reservoir) pressure,
which determines the reserve of formation energy and the properties of fluids in
reservoir (in-place) conditions. This pressure also governs gas reserves, well
yields, and the production conditions of pools.
The initial reservoir pressure depends on the depth of occurrence of the
producing horizon. If a well bore is filled with liquid and the well does not flow
naturally (does not blow out), the initial reservoir pressure pr (Pa) is defined as a
hydrostatic head:
pr = Hpg ( 2.12)
where H is the reservoir depth
p is the liquid density, kg/m3; and
g is gravitational acceleration, equal to 9.81 m2/s.
If a well flows, the reservoir pressure can be determined by the formula
Pr = H ρ g + ps
where ps is the surface (wellhead, or casing-head) pressure, Pa.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 109
If the level of liquid in the well bore is at some point below the wellhead, the
reservoir pressure is found from the formula
pr = H ρg (2.14)
where H is the height of liquid column in the well, m.

In a gas pool or in a gas-saturated portion of the oil formation, the reservoir
pressure is the same over the entire area of the gas pool. In oil reservoirs which
show considerable angles of dip, the reservoir pressure is maximum at limbs and
minimum in roof areas (Fig. 2.4). This makes it difficult to analyze the changes in
reservoir pressure during oil pool production

Dr.G.G.Rajan 110
iOil water
Fig. 2.4. Scheme for determining the re¬duced formation (reservoir)
pressure
It is convenient from a practical viewpoint to correlate the values of

reservoir pressure with a certain plane, or level. Such a plane is taken to be a sea
level, or a conditional subsea level, of the original plane of contact between oil and
water. The pressure in the pool corrected to this conditional plane is referred to as a
reduced, corrected pressure (datum pressure). Reduced reservoir pressures are
estimated from the formulas
P1rr = p1 + x1 ρ g
P2rr = p2 + x2 ρ g
where p1 and p2 are measured bottom-hole pressures (see Fig. 2.4); and x1
and x2 are the respective distances from the original water-oil contact plane to the
points where bottom-hole pressure measurements were taken by a downhole
pressure gage lowered into the well on a scraper wire.
Systematic control over reservoir pressure variations makes it possible to
judge the processes occurring in formations and more efficiently work oil deposits.
The temperature increases with the depth of the producing horizons. The rate
of a 1 °C temperature change with a change in depth of, on the average, 34 m, is
Dr.G.G.Rajan 111
called the geothermal gradient. But the geothermal gradient is not the same in
every oil field. For example, in the deposits of the Northern Caucasus the
temperature, at a depth of 1000 m, reaches 90-100°C, while in the Baku deposits
the geothermal gradient of 1°C corresponds to 50 m of the depth.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 112
5.WELL INJECTION METHODS
PRESSURE MAINTENANCE BY WATER OR GAS INJECTION
7.1. CONTROL OF THE ADVERSE EFFECT OF INJECTED WATER

ON THE INJECTIVITY OF WELLS
Water injected into productive strata must exhibit good oil-driving
(sweeping) properties. It should not enter into
Chemical reactions with stratal waters to yield insoluble salt sediments
Should not promote the swelling of formation clays.
Further more, it should contain the lowest possible quantities of mechanical
suspended particles and oil products and should be free of microorganisms. The
main water supply sources for flooding are surface bodies of water (rivers, lakes,
and seas), underground bodies of water occurring above the first water-confining
strata, and deep-lying aquifers. Investigations have revealed that the best flood
waters are field waste waters recovered with oil, process waters used at crude oil
treatment plants and machine shops, floodwater, rainwater, and storm water. We
can sometimes use waste water from oil refineries, chemicals plants, wool-washing
and textile mills, integrated ore-mining plants, and other enterprises. Injected water
commonly contains various dissolved salts, gases, solid colloidal particles,
microorganisms, and some quantities of emulsified oil.
Suspended solid particles and oil products can plug up the filtration channels
of producing beds and lower the injectivity of wells so much that they completely
stop taking in water. Suspended substances are mostly particles of clay, ooze, and
ferric oxide and hydroxide. A major portion of these particles settle on the bottom
of tanks and water basins during long sedimentation, though an appreciable
fraction remains in a suspended state.
EOR Decision making – Program

Dr.G.G.Rajan 113
Fine particles are made to precipitate through their coagulation by, for
example, adding to water aluminum sulfate which combines with calcium
bicarbonate:
A12(SO4)3 + 3 Ca(HCO3)2 = 2 CaCO3 + 2 A1(OH)4 + 6 SO3 (7.1)
This reaction yields a flaky aluminum hydroxide that settles in water and
entrains the particles of suspended substances. Coagulation proceeds more
intensively if the pH value of water is maintained higher than 7 by alkalizing it
with slaked lime Ca(OH)2.
Injected water often contains heightened quantities of bicarbonates of calcium
Ca(HCO3)2, and magnesium Mg(HC03)2. If they get into a high-temperature
stratum, these bicarbonates can precipitate in the form of insoluble salts, calcium
carbonate CaCO3 and magnesium carbonate MgCO3, thus decreasing the bed
permeability. Decarbonization is commonly conducted during coagulation by
alkalizing water with slaked lime. Alkalizing also applies to the removal of ferric
hydroxide Fe(OH)3 from water.
Apart from the above impurities, barely soluble or even completely insoluble
salts that can form and precipitate in porous channels during water injection can
also cause a decrease in the intake rates of wells and beds. For example, injecting
sulfur water into a bed containing waters of the calcium chloride type may lead to
the precipitation of virtually insoluble gypsum in the pores:
If the stratal water contains hydrogen sulfide and the injected water carries
both soluble and insoluble salts of iron, insoluble precipitates of ferric sulfide can
accumulate in the pores.
Clogging of porous channels can also be attributed to microorganisms and
various algae present in the injection water. Sulfide-reducing bacteria are the most
hazardous. They grow in anaerobic (oxygen-free) conditions and yield hydrogen
sulfide. A method of combatting these bacteria is to pump a 0.1-% or 0.2-%
Dr.G.G.Rajan 114
solution of formaldehyde, 50 to 100 m3 in volume, into bottom-hole formation
zones every 9 to 12 months.
Pumping equipment, tanks, and pipelines which come in contact v/ith water
are subject to corrosion. Practical methods to control corrosion are: (1) to use
nonmetallic materials in water supply systems, (2) to coat the tubing and
equipment with protective insulating materials, (3) to treat injected water with
chemical corrosion inhibitors, and (4) to employ cathodic and protector protection
on pumps and pipelines.
Of the above methods for protecting equipment and pipelines against
corrosion, the most universal and the least laborious approach is to treat the
injected waters, in particular waste waters, with corrosion inhibitors which form a
reliable protective film on the surface of tubes and equipment. In the Tatar oil
fields, for instance, several types of corrosion inhibitors and polyetho-xyamine
have been successfully used. However, the high cost of these inhibitors limits their
application.
Of particular importance in flooding formations is the stability of the
chemical composition of the injected water. The composition of surface waters
after conditioning is commonly stable. Intra bed waters also have a stable
composition. Field waste waters and the water of deep-lying strata, however,
contain a substantial amount of ferrous oxide. This reacts with atmospheric oxygen
and converts to ferric oxide, which then precipitates in the form of ferric
hydroxide. Thus, such waters require closed-type systems of treatment and
injection without access for atmospheric oxygen.
Water supply sources are chosen with much consideration for their oil-
sweeping (washing) capacity. Field waste waters are 105 to 108 % as effective as
sweet water because they have a higher salinity and contain surfactants which are
added to crude oil during its treatment in the field conditions.
Dr.G.G.Rajan 115
The oil-sweeping capacity of sweet water can be raised by adding
surfactants or polymers which thicken the water.
7.2. ASCERTAINING THE FITNESS OF WATER FOR INJECTION
Whether waters are fit for injection can be established by tests conducted
under both laboratory and field conditions. Water is considered suitable for
flooding if it does not cause an appreciable decrease in the permeability of a core
sample which is tested under various steady filtration conditions over the possible
range of injection pressures.
The quality of water required is also ascertained from the results of a pilot
injection of the water into the bed through the wells under various steady
conditions and at optimum values of pump pressures. A decrease in the filtration
rate of the water through the producing bed results in a decreased injectivity index
of the well.
To assess a permissible content of mechanical impurities in the water and
also the size of particles which could freely pass through the pores and fissures in
the bed, an injection well is left to flow out after prolonged water infusion.
Samples of out flowing water are then taken regularly to enable comparisons
between the size of the suspended particles and the size of the pores.
According to laboratory and field experiments, mechanical impurities
present in the injected water bridge the pore space if the ratio between the mean
diameter of pore channels and the mean size of suspended particles is lower than
5. If the ratio is higher than 5, suspended particles can freely travel in the pore
space. Given this ratio, the flood water of adequate quality can be chosen. It has
been found, for example, that field waste waters suitable for use in the Romashkino
and Tuymazy oil fields with a rock permeability of 0.2-0.3 µm2 can contain 10 to
15 mg/1 of emulsified oil and 15 to 20 mg/1 of suspended particles 3 to 8 µm in

Dr.G.G.Rajan 116
size. Where the permeability of beds reaches 0.5 µm2 and over, the oil content of
waste water can be as high as 30 mg/1 and the content of solid mechanical particles
5 to 10 µm in size can reach 40 to 50 mg/1.
Field waste waters with a higher content of oil products and impurities are
occassionally suitable since the fissures present in bottom-hole formation zones
can open up under injection pressures in excess of the critical value.
7.3. WATER SUPPLY SYSTEMS

A water supply system for water injection into beds comprises such facilities
as water-treatment stations, pumping plants, group pumping stations, and various
pipelines. A schematic diagram of one such system appears in Fig. 7.1.
Water conduits can be divided into water mains 3 and distributing conduits 6
depending on the purpose they are to serve. Main conduits deliver water either
from first-stage and second-stage pumping plants 2 or directly from individual
water intakes / to group pumping stations 5. For flooding circular (lenticular)
Fig. 7.1. Water supply system for oil-pool flooding

Dr.G.G.Rajan 117
beds, the water mains are laid around the perimeter of the beds to form a ring main
if the oil pools are large. If the pools are small the main conduits are laid along the
length of extended strata.
Distributing conduits comprising up to four pipelines buried In one trench extend
from pumping stations 5 to injection wells 7. They operate at a pressure up to 20
MPa. The conduit laying depth varies from 0.4 to 2.2 m, depending on the depth of
ground freezing. Storage tanks 4 of 4000-m3 to 5000-m3 capacity are erected near
large group pumping stations ready to supply water to the injection wells for 2 or 3
hours in cases of unforeseen stoppage oJ the first-stage and second-stage pumping
plants.
Water intake facilities, when possible, must be sited near oil fields. If the
intake draws water from a surface water reservoir, a wooden or metallic inlet
structure is built on the side of the pumps. The pumping installations are ordinary
high-pressure electrically-driven centrifugal pump units mounted in the pump
house. Depending on the layout of the ground, surface water intake facilities
deliver water to a first-lift pumping station or directly to a treatment station to
clean it of clay, silt, and microorganisms.
To recover subsurface (infrabed) water, shallow holes are drilled in the flood
plain of a river as far as the first water confining stratum. These holes intersect
upper water-bearing pebble or sand layers which directly communicate with the
river. A string of casing fitted out with a filter at its lower part is usually put down
into a water supply well to insure against the walls collapsing. Water is drawn by
vacuum high-delivery pumps or by submersible electric centrifugal pumps lowered
into a water supply well. To guard against the flooding of the wells by high water
in the spring, at the mouth of each well a concrete cap should be built in the form
of a sump with a sealed hatch. Water supply wells can give a high daily output, up
to 3000 m3 or even more.
Dr.G.G.Rajan 118
Figure 7.2 shows the schematic diagram of a siphon water intake which is
commonly used in areas where infrabed water stands at a high level. In the flood
bed of a river, water supply wells 2 are driven to a depth of 20 to 30 m through
water-bearing high-permeability deposits of coarse gravel and sand . The distance
between the wells ranges from 50 to 100 m, depending on their productive
capacity. The gathering main 3 carries water from wells 2 to vacuum tanks 4
located in the house of first-lift pumping station 5. Vacuum pumps 6 of this station
deliver water through main conduit 7 to a second-lift pumping station or to
underground reservoirs 8 of group pumping station 9. From this station high-
capacity centrifugal pump units 10 force water through distributing conduits into
the injection wells.
If water-bearing alluvial or other deposits lie at a large depth, water intakes
use individual submersible centrifugal pumps producing a head from 80 to 280 m.
Since these pumps provide a sufficient head, the water pumped out of the wells is
fed either to the second-lift pumping station or directly to the main conduits for
delivery to group pumping stations, the water supply route being dependent on the
terrain. Experience gained in the opera¬tion of infrabed water intakes shows that
this method of water lift is 20 to 30 % more expensive than the siphon intake
method.
The output of water supply wells decreases as the products of corrosion and
calcium carbonate gradually accumulate in the filters and bottom-hole zones. High
water production rates can be maintained by flushing the filters with clean water,
draining the bottom-hole zones, pumping out the water more vigorously, and
treating the wells with acids.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 119
Water-treatment stations.
A plant for conditioning water for flooding comprises a number of facilities.
As illustrated by Fig. 7.3, pumps 1 lift water from the reservoir and deliver it to
mixer 3. Dosimeter 2 adds a requisite amount of coagulant to the water along its
route to the mixer. The water then flows into clarifier 4 to allow a basic portion of
suspended particles to settle. As the water passes through gravel filters 5, some
remaining particles precipitate in the layer of sand and gravel. The treated water is
stored in reservoirs 6, from whence it is delivered to the group pumping stations by
pumps 7 and further distributed among the injection wells. Pumps 8 serve to wash
out the gravel filters when they become clogged.
The use of field waste waters for maintaining reservoir pressure makes it
possible to cut down the consumption of fresh water, preclude environmental
contamination, and ensure a high intake rate of injection wells since clay
particles from the bed rocks do not swell in saline waters.
Field waste waters are currently cleared of emulsified oil and mechanical
impurities mainly by methods of sedimentation and filtering. Old producing fields
still widely use settling ponds, oil traps, and sand traps for water treatment.
However, these facilities are expensive since they require reinforced concrete for

Dr.G.G.Rajan 120
their construction, occupy large areas, and do not exclude water contact with the
environmental air, which raises water corrosivity.
In new large oil fields, waste water-treatment systems employ vertical

sedimentation tanks or horizontal head settlers which preclude the contact of water
with air.
Sedimentation tanks 5 (Fig. 7.4), each sited at a different level, form a
cascade of treatment facilities which operate in the following manner.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 121
The waste water flows from a crude oil treatment plant (CTP) through
pipeline / and enters lower perforated radial distributing header 4. The emulsified
oil filters through a layer of waste water, gets washed out and gradually
accumulates in the upper part of tank 5. Pump 8 then draws the stored oil via upper
radial header 7 and forces it out into the CTP or into line / to treat the oil
additionally by "washing" it through the layer of waste water accumulated in the

lower part of tank 5. The pretreated water flows by gravity into radial header 3,
enters bypass header 9, leaves tank 5 and gets into upper radial distributing header
10 of sedimentation tank. An insignificant amount of the emulsified oil left in the
water gathers in the upper part of tank, and the treated water collected in its lower
part passes through radial header 3 and flows through pipeline 12 to the group
pumping stations which inject it into the wells. Mechanical impurities collected in
the bottom of tanks are dumped down pipelines 2.
Sedimentation tanks are made complete with sealed floating roofs 6 to keep
the water from coming in contact with the air.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 122
Modern systems for the field treatment of oil, gas, and water widely use
horizontal head settlers (Fig. 7.5). Field waste water with emulsified oil flows
through flaring inlet pipe into a horizontal tank whose forward portion has
perforated baffle 2 to level out the flow velocity. Next water arrives at chambers 4
filled with corrugated hydrophobic material and having hydro-phobic coatings.
Droplets of emulsified oil show a better wetting ability than water, so they
stick to the surface of corrugated sheets, get larger and float into the upper
part of the tank, from which the oil is drawn out through pipe connection 5. The
treated water is discharged through outlet pipe 6 complete with a flow controller
and delivered to group pumping stations for its distribution among the injection
1 2
Fig. 7.5. Horizontal head settler for waste-water treatment
wells. The head settlers have access hatch holes 3. Waste waters are also
purified by filtration using gravel-quartz bed filters. The filter media used are a
porous clay aggregate (filler for cement), anthracite chips, graphite, hay, wood
shavings, and other materials. The efficiency of a treatment plant depends on the
rate of sedimentation or filtration, waste-water temperature, surfactants content,
the physicochemical properties of oils and waters, the concentration of emulsified
oil and mechanical impurities, gas saturation, and other factors.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 123
Group pumping stations (GPSs) serve to inject treated water into producing
formations. The number of GPSs, their distribution over the oil field, and the
capacity of pumping units at each station are determined on the basis of the field
development program and technical-economic calculations. It is expedient to site
pumping plants near injection wells in order to avoid large hydraulic losses in
pipelines and to decrease the possibility of entraining suspended mechanical
impurities in the form of corrosion products into bottom-hole zones.
Today's group pumping station comprises a pump house, fitting shop,
control compartment, metering pump room, and reagent storage room.
Depending on the number of injection wells and injection pressure required,
the pump house can include two to eight centrifugal pumps developing a discharge
pressure of 4 to 20 MPa; one or two of these pumps are kept on standby. One
pumping station can simultaneously serve up to 20 injection wells, depending on
their intake rates. Table 7.1 lists the discharge pressure and delivery of pumps
installed at pumping stations.
The first four pumps are early types which are still in operation in some old
producing fields; the other five pumps are more advanced centrifugal types which
are gradually ousting the former pumps
Table 7.1
Pump of Discharg Delivery, Pump of Discharg Delivery,

old type e ms/h new type e m*/h
pressure pressure
I 4-6 150-130 1 10 180
II 4-6 150-130 II 12.5 180

Dr.G.G.Rajan 124
III 10-12 150 III 15 180
IV 15 160 IV 17.2 180
V 20 180
Stationary group pumping stations are costly installations, and their

construction takes much time. New producing fields have begun to use unitized
group pumping stations (UGPSs) equipped with centrifugal pumps. They 'produce
a discharge pressure from 10 to 20 MPa and are driven by electric motors which
consume from 750 to 1 530 kW of power.
Unitized pumping stations are made into units at machine works and
assembled in oil fields during 3 or 4 months. These stations can ensure a daily
delivery of 3600, 7200, or 10800 m3 water, depending on the number of pumping
units.
The UGPS (Fig. 7.6) includes pumps, auxiliary equipment, and control
units. Pumping units and auxiliary equipment are installed in sectionalized
carriages joined together to form a unified electrically-heated pump house.
1The station operates in the following way. Main 1 carries water to header 2
from which it flows to centrifugal pumps 4 driven by electric motors 5. The pumps
force the water through remote-controlled discharge gate valves 3 into high-head
distributor 7 where the pressure is kept up to 9.5-19 MPa. Next, the water passes
through gate valves 8 and 9 and flow meters 6 and then arrives at the injection
wells.
The 400-m3 capacity metallic tanks can keep pumps in operation for two
hours in the event of a water supply failure from the main. The automatic control
system of the station envisages a hydraulic protection of pumps if the suction end
pressure drops below the permissible level (0.2 or 0.3 MPa). Booster pumps are set

Dr.G.G.Rajan 125
up on the suction lines to ensure the steady operation of the pumping units drawing
water from the tanks.
This pumping arrangement allows for the washing of both, wells and
distributing conduits by overflow and also enables the drainage of bottom-hole
zones to free them from plugging agents by intermittent short-time overflows. For
this to be done
Subsurface
tanks
Fig. 7.6. Schematic representation of a To injection

unitized group pumping station wells
it is necessary to close valves 9, open valves 10, and drain the water from the wells
through header into evaporation tanks.
Fully automated unattended pumping stations are now becoming more and
more popular. A local automatic control unit of the station sends alarm signals to
the central control room in cases of a fault in an electric motor, the overheating of
the pump or motor bearings, a sharp pressure drop in the suction pipeline due to
Dr.G.G.Rajan 126
the rupture of a distributing conduit, the breakdown of a pump shaft, excessive
leakage through pump clearances (packing boxes), and a failure in the water supply
to the station.
Pressure gages and flow recorders fitted on the pump delivery lines and
distributing conduits permit continuous control of the delivery pressure and intake
capacity of the injection wells. Instrument readings are sent to the central control
room to keep a daily account of the quantity of water injected into the bed. Special
repair and emergency crews correct various faults and breakdowns.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 127
7.4. THE USE OF SUBSURFACE WATER
A number of oil fields produce injection water from water bearing horizons
occurring above or below the pay beds. The subsurface water injection systems are
of the closed type to avoid the contact of water-dissolved ferrous oxide with
atmospheric oxygen, which otherwise would yield ferric hydroxide sediments.
At present, a variety of methods for injecting subsurface water into oil beds
are used in field development.
Figure 7.7 illustrates one of the methods. Water is withdrawn from water
supply wells by using either the effect of the formation pressure or special high-
capacity pumps 2 and is fed to a group pumping plant whose pumps deliver it
through distributing conduits to injection wells 3.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 128
This water supply and injection system eliminates the need for constructing
river intakes and high-lift stations and also offers the advantage of shorter main
conduits. In West-Siberian oil fields, for example, a system of this type can deliver
water to one pumping station from 2 or 3 water supply wells. The quantity of water
is enough to operate 6 to 10 injection wells.
The forced inter-well water-flow system is similar to the first method.

Pumping units, usually electrical submersible centrifugal pumps, lowered into the
water supply wells lift the water to the surface and force it, bypassing the pumping
station, directly into the injection wells whose number depends on their total intake
capacity and the capacity of the water supply wells.
If the productivity of a water-bearing stratum is low, the water supply well

may feed only one injection well. A pumping unit of a lower capacity is then
chosen, but the head it produces must be sufficient to inject water into the bed.
The check on injection rates is kept with the aid of flow meters fitted at each
wellhead. The system of forced inter-well flow obviates the need for pumping
stations and thus requires a much shorter network of distributing conduits.
One more method of water injection used in many oil fields is the method of
forced inter-formational flow, i. e. forced cross-flow between the beds in the
same well, as illustrated in Fig. 7.8.
Here packer 4 isolates water-bearing formation 3 from oil formation 6 to

enable the transfer of water by turned-over electric submersible centrifugal pump 2
lowered on the tubing into the hole and set up a short distance from the wellhead.
Water flows from bed 3 into a tubing-casing annulus and upward to the
suction pipe of the pump, which forces it down tubing 5 and injects into bed 6.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 129
Flow meter / provides for control over the volume of injected water. In this
method of water injection, the reservoir pressure maintenance facilities include
only injection wells and electric power lines.
1. Flow meter
2. Pump
3.Water bearing formation
4.Packer
5.Down tubing
6.Oil bearing formation
Fig. 7.8. Water injection by the method of

forced inter-formational flow
7.5. HIGH INJECTIVITY MAINTENANCE
The intake capacity of injection wells gradually decreases since the pressure
within the bottom-hole zones tends to grow as mechanical impurities clog filtration
surfaces and bicarbonates undergo disintegration.
Various methods of treating bottom-hole zones by solutions of surfactants,
acids, and other liquids will be dealt with in Chapter 16. Here we shall consider

Dr.G.G.Rajan 130
only the methods of draining a bottom-hole zone by allowing injection wells to
overflow mainly through the drainage comb of the group pumping station.
Prolonged overflow for one day or more is essential if the intake rate of a
well drops noticeably. The bottom-hole zone gets somewhat rid of the plugging
agents, and the injectivity of some wells grows, albeit little and for a short period.
The causes responsible for such a low effect are the following.
The stream discharge after opening the well for overflow is Initially very
high because the bottom-hole pressure falls off sharply. The fluid moves out at a
high velocity and intensively cleans the bottom-hole zone of clogging materials.
Next, the formation pressure begins to redistribute itself, first in small areas and
then in larger and larger areas. The pressure gradient decreases to a fraction of the
initial value causing the velocity of fluid flow toward the bottom hole to diminish
accordingly. The result is that the stream becomes less effective in its cleaning
capacity. In addition, the long overflow causes the excess pressure in the bottom-
hole zone to decline, with the result that the fractures close up. The plugging
material gets stuck in the fractures and cannot be taken toward the bottom hole at
the low differential pressure and decreased velocities of the fluid flow.
Long overflows are economically disadvantageous because a large quantity
of previously injected water is thrown off the bed. For example, in only one day,
some wells in the Tuymazy oil field eject up to 3000 m3 water. The daily steady
intake rate of the same wells after overflowing does not often exceed 150-200 m3.
In an effort to reduce the volume of water drained off the beds, cut down the
length of the procedure, and facilitate the cleaning of pores and cracks of the
bottom-hole zone by the ascending water, a method has been developed to drain
the bottom-hole zone of injection wells by multiple short-term overflows with a
brief shutdown in-between to restore the bottom-hole pressure.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 131
The procedure is as follows. Soon after the pumping is cut off, the well is
quickly opened to allow it to flow for 10 to 12 min. Then it is shut for 6 or 7 min in
order to restore the bottom-hole pressure, this cycle being repeated a few times.
Practice shows that such a shutdown provides enough time for the bottom-hole
pressure to rise to 80-90 % of its initial value. On opening the well anew, the
elastic energy of the fluid and formation rocks blows the water out of the bottom-
hole zone at a tremendous velocity. At the start of each cycle the filtration surfaces
of the zone undergo intensive cleaning. As the bottom-hole pressure grows close to
its original value by virtue of the elastic deformation of the fluid and formation
rocks, fissures in the bottom-hole zone open up. At the moment the well starts to
flow, the fissures do not close up instantly but remain open for a certain short
interval of time. Since the fluid flow velocity is high, the clogging material is
readily washed off the crack filtration surfaces and carried out for a certain
distance toward the bore¬hole. After shutting off the well in the next cycle, the
bottom-hole pressure builds up above the reservoir pressure, so the fissures open
again and let the plugging agent free. Now that the well is quickly opened, the
contaminants are free to make another move toward the borehole.
So, at the start of each cycle high initial velocities of the flow at the moment
when the fissures still remain open produce the most favorable conditions for the
removal of clogging agents from the bottom-hole zone.
After carrying out six or seven cycles, the well is left flowing for 30 to 60
min to eject unclean water from the well bore and flush out the conduit .The
procedure of treating one well takes two to four hours, following which the well is
put back on stream.
The above drainage brings to the surface a large amount of corrosion
products, primarily ferric hydroxide. However, this method is not effective for all
wells. A sharp increase in the intake rate is evident where the bottom-hole zones
Dr.G.G.Rajan 132
are made up of high-permeability rocks having an improved pattern of fractures
which open or close, depending on the change of the bottom-hole pressure.
This method also suffers from the disadvantage that the differential pressure
at the bottom decreases with time as the result of a redistribution of the pressure
near the borehole over the formation. The opening of the fissures in the bottom-
hole zone then gradually decreases, as does the velocity of the fluid leaving the
bed. The cleaning of the filtration surfaces thus proceeds less effectively.
The Tatar Petroleum Project Planning Research Institute has improved this
method of bottom-hole zone drainage. To guard against the total closing of fissures
during short-term overflows, the bottom-hole pressure is kept above the hydrostatic
pressure by partially opening the discharge gate valve on the wellhead or on the
drainage comb of the pumping station. To illustrate the effectiveness of drainage
with the uplift pressure on the bottom, consider the drainage tests conducted on an
injection well in the Romashkino oil field.
After the supply of injection water was cut off, the well was left to flow
repeatedly for short periods of time through the annular space. The maximum
content of suspended particles in the water ejected to the surface was 6300 mg/1.
At the end of the last 60-min cycle the amount of suspended particles in the water
dropped to 100 mg/1. The total amount of mechanical impurities removed from the
bed for the entire period of drainage was 30 kg. The water discharge was then cut
back sharply, thereby raising the wellhead pressure to 2.5 MPa. The mean flow
rate dropped from 960 to 640 m3 per day. The content of suspended particles in the
ejected water increased to 8700 mg/1. As a result, another 24.5 kg of mechanical
impurities was withdrawn from the bed. The wellhead pressure was then stepped
up to 5 MPa. The flow rate at the start of each cycle decreased to 330 m3 per day,
and the amount of suspended particles in the extracted water came to 3 100 mg/1.
At this last stage an additional 4.2 kg of clogging materials was brought to the
Dr.G.G.Rajan 133
surface. The tests have showed that the drainage method is more effective if the
bottom-hole pressure is kept above the level of hydrostatic one.
7.6. GAS INJECTION INTO THE UPPER PARTS OF THE FORMATION
The aim of injecting petroleum gas or natural gas into the upper parts of the
reservoir is to enable the oil pool to produce under gas drive or to shift from
solution-gas drive to gas-cap drive.
The beds where the most favorable conditions exist for pressure
maintenance by gas injection are steeply dipping strata composed of lithologically
homogeneous rocks of good permeability , saturated with low-viscosity oils.
Where the conditions are different a fast coning of gas into oil wells may
occur, with the result that the oil retained in the capillaries of low-permeability
portions of the pool will be left un-swept.
Either noncommercial wells drilled in high-permeability bed sections are
chosen for the injection of gas or air, or else new wells are driven for this purpose.
The injection pressure must be 10 to 20 % higher than the reservoir pressure. This
necessitates the construction of high-pressure high-capacity gas-compressor
stations, which involves large capital outlays.
Oil production practices, therefore, limit the use of this method of pressure
maintenance to rather shallow formations at a later stage of field development
when the reservoir pressure has dropped considerably.
The total volume of injected gas reduced to the formation conditions must
equal the total volume of liquid recovered from the formation. The daily gas
injection rate is defined experimentally proceeding from the gas intake capacity of
injection wells. A daily intake rate of 10000 to 25000 m3 is standard. At present,
the gas injection approach is rarely used because of the expense of the process and
the shortage of gas.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 134
CO2 injection
In most oil and gas fields, only a small proportion (typically 20-40%) of
original oil in place (OOIP) is recovered using standard petroleum extraction
methods.
Carbon dioxide injected into a depleted oil reservoir with suitable
characteristics can achieve enhanced oil recovery through two processes, miscible
or immiscible displacement.
Miscible processes are more efficient and most common in active EOR
projects. However, immiscible flooding may become increasingly important if
widespread CO2 sequestration takes place in depleted oil fields, where reservoir
conditions are not suitable for miscible flooding.
Carbon dioxide can exist in four distinct phases depending upon temperature
and pressure: vapor or gas, liquid, solid, and supercritical. Oil and gas operators
generally handle CO2 in its supercritical phase, which is stable above the critical
point of 6.9 MPa (1087 psi) and 31°C (88°F). In its supercritical state, C02 may be
considered to be a fluid, wherein the terms gas and liquid lose their conventional
meaning. In general terms, the supercritical phase behaves like a liquid with
respect to density, and like a gas with respect to viscosity.
Miscible C02 Displacement:
Under suitable reservoir pressure and oil density conditions (generally

deeper than 1,200 m with oil lighter than 22° API gravity), injected carbon dioxide
will mix thoroughly with the oil within the reservoir such that the interfacial
tension between these two substances effectively disappears. Theoretically, all
contacted oil can be recovered under miscible conditions, although in practice
recovery is usually limited to about 10 to 15% of OOIP.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 135
Immiscible CO2 Displacement:
When reservoir pressure is too low and/or oil gravity too dense, the injected
carbon dioxide remains physically distinct from the oil within the reservoir.
However, injected CO2 still can improve oil recovery by causing the oil to swell,
reducing the oil's density and improving mobility. Currently, only one large EOR
project (in Turkey) utilizes immiscible processes. Several other smaller immiscible
EOR projects are underway in the U.S. Although less efficient, the use of
immiscible displacement processes may expand if CO2 sequestration is
implemented on a large scale in depleted oil fields.
Once oil is mobilized by CO2, or freed from its residual saturation state that
normally locks it in place within the reservoir, it must be either pushed or pulled to
the production well. For improved oil recovery, CO2 injection frequently is
alternated with water injection in a water-alternating-gas (WAG) process. In
practice, a "slug" of injected CO2 is repeatedly alternated with water drive, over
intervals ranging from several weeks to months (Figure 2-1).
Figure 2-2 illustrates the typical surface configuration of an enhanced oil
recovery project, while Figure 2-3 shows the linkages of the field to CO2 supplies
and petroleum markets.
Significant electric power may be used in each of these steps:
• Carbon dioxide from natural or anthropogenic sources (potentially including
flue gas) is transported to the field via a dedicated pipeline and injected via a
dedicated CO2 injection well (major electric power demand for anthropogenic
sources only).
• Oil, water, natural gas, and carbon dioxide are produced by a production well
and then these fluid components are separated at the surface (major electric power
demand).
Dr.G.G.Rajan 136
• Oil and natural gas is collected and sold. Waste water is processed and then re-
injected in a water disposal well (major electric power demand).
• Carbon dioxide is separated, compressed, and recycled back into the formation
in the CO2 injector well (major electric power demand).
• The life span of a typical CO2-EOR project is in the range of 10 to 30 years,
depending on a variety of technical and economic variables, such as the ratio of
CO2 injection to oil recovery, market prices of oil and the CO2 injectant,
operational costs, and other factors.

Dr.G.G.Rajan 137
Dr.G.G.Rajan 138
Steam Injection EOR.
Two main methods are used for thermal EOR: cyclic steam and steam flood
(Figure 6-1). Both work on the dual principles that heat can decrease the viscosity
of heavy oil, improving its mobility and recovery, while water injection can
maintain reservoir pressure and improve sweep
The cyclic steam method, which was developed first and commercially
implemented in the 1960's, uses alternate periods of steam injection followed by oil
production. This method uses less capital, because no dedicated steam injection
well is required, although the production well casing may need upgrading to handle

Dr.G.G.Rajan 139
steam injection. However, cyclic steam injection is a less efficient oil recovery
method than steam flood because the steam penetrates only a limited radius around
the production well. Nevertheless, this method still is fairly common in many
California heavy oil fields, and is particularly important at Midway-Sunset,
Cymric, Wilmington and other fields.

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6. WELL TEST ANALYSIS

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In a nutshell, well test analysis deals with flow rates, pressure drops, changes
in product composition and properties and also the condition of the well. From the
well pressure data, it is possible to estimate the future production trends and also
the economics of oil recovery.

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7. MISCIBLE DISPLACEMENT METHODS
In this displacement method, the fluid used for displacement can be a gas or
a liquid, miscible with oil ( similar to CO2). A typical one dimensional CO2
miscible process is as shown below.
Pure CO2 is injected at the extreme end section of the reservoir well. CO2 is
miscible with oil at the well temperature and pressure. This condenses into oil
layer and causes separation of oil or displaces pure oil as shown below.

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Miscible Processes:
contacts, forming a single oil-like liquid that can flow through
the reservoir more easily then the original crude. A variety of such processes have
been developed using different fluids that can mix with oil, including alcohols,
carbon dioxide, petroleum hydrocarbons such as propane or propane-butane
mixtures, and petroleum gases rich in ethane, propane, butane, and pentane.

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material must be used sparingly. In this process, a “slug,” which varies from 5 to
50 percent of the reservoir volume, is pushed through the reservoir by gas, water
(brine), or chemically treated brine to contact and displace the mixture of fluid and
oil.
early stages of development. Because of the high value of hydrocarbons and
chemicals derived from hydrocarbons, it is generally felt that such materials would
not make desirable injection fluids under current or future economic conditions.
For this reason, attention has turned to C02 as a solvent. Conditions for complete
mixing of C02 with crude oil depend on reservoir temperature and pressure and on
the chemical nature and density of the oil. Although there are many possible CO2
sources, the largest source should be naturally occurring deposits

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Mechanism :
Carbon dioxide is capable of dissolving in large quantities both in water and

in hydrocarbons. The viscosity of water then increases while that of hydrocarbons
diminishes. The solubility of carbonic acid gas in oil rises with the decreasing
molecular mass of oil. Carbon dioxide is fully miscible in light oils at 5 to 7 MPa.
This process involves the injection of liquid carbon dioxide to form a plug
pushed through the bed by carbonated water into the formation. As the carbon
dioxide and oil dissolve together, the viscosity of the oil decreases while its
volume grows and the oil-water interfacial tension diminishes.
Carbon dioxide that comes in contact with oil tends to extract light oil
components. Thus, a gaseous bank whose viscosity is much lower than that of oil
moves ahead of the carbon dioxide plug pushed by the water. Carbon dioxide is
thought to raise the formation permeability as it reacts with rocks.
The method of oil displacement by carbonated water (4 or 5 % carbon
dioxide) was tried in the Aleksandrovsk area of the Tuymazy field with good
results. U. S. specialists believe that the use of liquid CO2 as a driving medium
considerably increases the effectiveness of the displacement process.
OIL DISPLACEMENT BY THE THICKENED WATER PLUG
Research has ascertained that the oil recovery of reservoirs depends heavily
on the ratio between the mobilities of water and oil
M = (kw/µw) / (ko/µo)
where kw and k0 are the effective rock permeabilities of water and oil respectively;
and µw and µo are the dynamic viscosities of water and oil respectively.

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If M is large in value, water readily cones into the producing wells. The
mobility of water can be reduced by raising its viscosity with the aid of thickeners.
The thickening agents used for this purpose are water-soluble polymers, for
example, polyacrylamide. This agent is a high-molecular compound which
dissolves easily in water and produces viscous solutions when added even in small
concentrations to water. Thus, an addition of merely 0.05 % of polyacrylamide is
enough to obtain a pseudoplastic solution displaying structural-strength properties.
Polyacrylamide solutions have a lower surface tension at the boundary of oil.
The oil displacement process reduces to the following. A liquid solution of
polyacrylamide is first injected into the producing bed to form a thickened water
plug. Then the water treated as usual is pumped down to push the plug. The bank
of oil and the bank of connate water appear ahead of the thickened water fringe.
The injected water pushes the plug and connate water forward thus forcing oil out
of the bed. The first portions of thickened water mix with connate water and the
rear part oi the plug mixes with injected water.
The method of oil displacement by the thickened water plug is still in the
testing stage. In initial experiments, however, oil recovery was increased by 5-6 %.

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8. CHEMICAL FLOODING
Chemical Enhanced Oil Recovery
1. Description:
The Chemical Methods of Enhanced Oil Recovery helps to substitute /
complement the traditional Enhanced-Oil Recovery (EOR) by chemical methods.
While a number of chemicals may be used in this project, the Alkaline-Surfactant-
Polymer (ASP) process is a popular technology in Chemical EOR process
technology.
The ASP process exploits the synergy of components in the ASP blend to
optimize (diminish) the overall use of chemicals, to simultaneously provide
mobility control, reduction of residual oil saturation (mobilizing capillary
trapped oil) by the combined action of the surfactant and the alkali, and
reduction of surfactant use by mitigating adsorption in the reservoir rock.
Wyoming is an organization that enjoys a successful recent history of
Chemical Flooding applications leading to substantial additional oil recovery.
Table 1 summarizes a classical view of the individual contributions of the ASP
components.

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Table 4.2 lists chemicals described in patent literature. Chemicals commonly
used include broad spectrum petroleum and synthetic petroleum sulfonates;
alcohols; polyacrylamide and polysaccharide polymers; sodium dichlorophenol
and sodium pentachtorophenol; sodium hydroxide and sodium silicate. These do
not appear particularly hazardous in the concentrations used, nor do they become
concentrated
in food chains. However, the manufacturing, handling, and disposal of these
chemicals pose potential biological impacts.
If chemical flooding methods are widely adopted, there must be a substantial
increase in the production of some of these chemicals, especially the surfactants.
Expanded manufacturing capacity could result in localized adverse impacts
through loss of habitat and potential air and water emissions.
Transportation of the chemicals commonly used for EOR operations is not likely to
pose a major hazard.
Table 4.2 Potential Chemicals Used in Chemical Flooding

Chemicals Proposed for Surfactant Flooding:
Broad spectrum petroleum sulfonates
Synthetic petroleum sulfonates
* Sulfated ethoxylated alcohols
* Alcohols
“ Ethoxylated alcohols
Chemicals Proposed as Bactericldes:
* Sodium dichlorophenol
* Sodium pentachlorophenol
Formaldehyde
Gluteraldehyde
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Paraformaldehyde
Alkyl phosphates
Alkylamines
Acetate salts of coco diamines
Acetate salts of coco amines
Acetate salts of tallow diamines
AlkyIdlmethl ammonium chloride
COCO dlmethyl ammonium chloride
Sodium salts of phenols
Substituted phenols
Sodium hydroxide
Calcium sulfate
Chemicals Proposed for Alkline Flooding:
* Sodium hydroxide
* Sodium silicate
Ammonium hydroxide
Sodium carbonate
Potassium Hydroxlde
Chemicals Proposed for Mobility Control:
* Polyacrylamide
* Polysaccharide
Aldoses B Series
Aldoses L Series
Car boxy methylcelIulose
Carboxyvinyl polymer
Dextrdns
Deoxyribonucleic acid
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Ketoses B Series
Ketoses L Series
Polyethylene oxide
Polyisobutylene in benzene
Conjugated saccharides
Disaccharides
Monoosaccharides
Tetrasaccharldes

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9. WATER FLOODING

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β ratio of volume change of crude oil in reservoir vs produced oil
Rs GOR of crude in the reservoir
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the reservoir. It is occasionally profitable to produce this oil, but gravity
drainage does not make a significant contribution to the world’s reserves.
Compaction drive : Over pressured reservoirs may experience compaction
as they deplete because the overpressured fluids prevent normal
compaction. E.g. North sea chalk fields.

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Water flood management is critical, particularly for poor quality or
geologically complex reservoirs. Most important aspect in this type of EOR is oil
production response to a water flood. Water flooding has an impact on gas and
water production response as well as injection analysis and reservoir pressure
response.
Gas-oil Ratio and Water-oil Ratio
An indicator of bypassing is a premature drop in gas-oil ratio i.e., earlier
than expected collapse of gas saturation. Early gas collapse (water fillup) may
indicate that channeling has occurred.
In layered reservoirs with no or little vertical crossflow, water injection in an
initially depressurized layer will cause GOR to drop rapidly. Often naturally
fractured reservoirs exhibit fast gas collapse because water fills up the fracture
system and does not initially invade the matrix, the desired target for water
flooding.
Figure 1 shows an example of a pattern where channeling has occurred.
This type of pattern should be reviewed geologically to attempt to identify the thief
zones/natural fractures.
Other key performance indicators are water breakthrough times and
subsequent WOR trends, which also can be indicative of channeling and bypassing
problems. However, since wells or patterns showing high WOR rise or quick gas
collapse may simply be due to high injection rates, one should plot WOR and GOR
versus Hydro Carbon pore volume injected (HCPVI). In general, if water
breakthrough occurs before 20% hydrocarbon pore volume injected (HCPVI),
channeling or bypassing due to heterogeneity is likely occurring.

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Like the WOR or GOR versus time plots, the log of WOR versus cumulative
oil produced (Np) is used as an indication of channeling and heterogeneity (Figures
2 – 4).( 1 , 2 )
In an unfavorable mobility ratio situation (M >1), the late time slope of the
graph is primarily controlled by the oil water relative permeability curves;
therefore, volumetric sweep efficiency can be derived from this plot.(2) In a
favorable mobility ratio situation (M (1), the late time slope of the graph is
controlled primarily by permeability heterogeneityor fluid segregation.

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In layered systems, the WOR versus Np plot may have a stair-type profile as
various layers breakthrough (Figure 4). Plotting WOR versus Np and comparing
individual patterns against a group average (e.g., for an entire unit operation) gives
a qualitative indicator of volumetric sweep efficiency.
This should be evaluated in the context of known or suspected geological
trends. Stylized representations of waterflood performance in simplistic geological
cross sections are depicted in the companion insets to Figures 3 and 4.
Extrapolation of the WOR versus Np plot and changes in its slope can
indicate incremental oil recovery. Therefore, an examination of the log of WOR
versus Np plot is useful in determining the incremental recovery due to infill
drilling or operational changes, as shown in Figure 5.
The changing slope of the curve indicates increased reserves after infill
drilling. In our experience, successful additional recovery efforts (including
recompletions or treatments to suppress water as well as infill drilling) can make

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substantial, noticeable changes in the WOR versus Np relationship.

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10. GAS FLOODING
Objective :
To maximize crude oil production at minimum cost and sustain production

rates compatible with demand.
Reality :
In actual crude oil production from successful yielding wells, the production
rates start falling down and the recovery stage is given the nomenclature as given
below.
EOR Decision making program 210

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Gas injection method is one of the Enhanced Oil Recovery technologies
employed. As could be seen from the above figure, Gas used in EOR process may
be miscible or immiscible with the oil phase.
Gases used are CO2, Hydrocarbon, Nitrogen, Flue gas , Air etc. While CO2
and hydrocarbon gases are soluble in Oil phase, pure Nitrogen and Nitrogen
present in flue gas are immiscible which may be injected into the well for
enhancing oil production.
Immiscible gas infection for Enhanced oil Recovery.:
In principle, this is similar to Carbon-di-oxide flooding discussed earlier.

While CO2 is soluble in both the oil and water in various proportions, immiscible
gas flooding aims at using gases like flue gas / CO2 huff . Whether the process is
economically feasible and technically viable in water flooded reservoirs constitutes
an on going experiment in many oil wells, especially in Canada.
There are three activities which are involved in the techno economic
evaluation of the process. They are
o Measurement of phase behavior and physical properties of oil / gas mixtures
at increasing and decreasing reservoir pressures that mimic the process
conditions of the reservoir
o Core floods to measure the oil recovery efficiency of each huff / puff cycle
o Numerical simulation to enable the prediction of the fluid properties at
conditions beyond those of experimental measurements
It may be noted that water alone is not adequate to maximize oil recovery. A
typical cavity is shown below to explain this concept. Black section denotes the
presence of oil in a cavity.

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When water flooding is done, water passes through the cavity and pushes the
oil layer upwards as shown. Blue color depicts water layer.
When water and an immiscible gas is injected, oil displacement from the
cavity is maximum as shown above.
This shows that immiscible gas with water injection has a tendency to
enhance oil production, especially when the well has reached tertiary stage. Hence
it is advantageous to go in for an immiscible gas like Nitrogen along with water in
EOR process.

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N2 as injectant has the following advantages.
o Source : From Combustion , Membrane separation, or Liquid N2 from Air

o Separation Plants.
o Inert : N2 being inert doesn’t dissolve in water or oil appreciable and
o tends to be less miscible
o Availability : Any where without the need for large pipe lines.
Constitutes about 80 % on atmospheric emissions like flue gas.

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Advantages of using CO2/N2 from emission gas
o Compression of exhaust gas for injection
o Multiplies volume of gas available 8-9 times for pressure maintenance
o Presence of CO2 offers miscible benefits like easy separation of oil and
water phases;
o Recycling possible.
Note the volume of exhaust gas for injection is about 9 times the feed gas.
A case study is presented below to understand the effectiveness of

immiscible gas injection with CO2.

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Advantages of Gas Injection thro’ water leg :
Increased Oil Recovery.
o Better distribution of Nitrogen
o Same spill point – both water and nitrogen rise upwards
o Piston like displacement
Reduced costs
o Minimum recompletion work in producing wells
o Minimize gas requirement
o Injected gas trapped in ‘tea cups’. So, less gas production
o Reduced surface water consumption & handling costs.

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11. MISCIBLE GAS FLOODING
Miscible gas flooding was presented in earlier chapters. In this section we

shall cover the basic principles involved in miscible gas flooding. Refer to the
EOR techniques given below.
In case of gas flooding, hydrocarbon gases like methane, ethane, propane,

hydrogen etc and CO2 form miscible gases. Except CO2, which is soluble in both
oil and water, all the others are soluble only in the crude oil. If the gas infected in
the well is light, it will dissolve in the crude oil phase resulting in reduction in
density and viscosity. By this property change, oily layer will have a tendency to
separate faster, than base condition.

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Gas injection is the most commonly used EOR technique. Here, gas such as
carbon dioxide (CO2), natural gas, or nitrogen is injected into the reservoir
whereupon it expands and thereby pushes additional oil to a production wellbore,
and moreover dissolves in the oil to lower its viscosity and improves the flow rate
of the oil.
Oil displacement by CO2 / miscible gas injection relies on the phase
behaviour of CO2 / miscible gas and crude oil mixtures that are strongly dependent
on reservoir temperature, pressure and crude oil composition.
These mechanisms range from oil swelling and viscosity reduction for
injection of immiscible fluids (at low pressures) to completely miscible
displacement in high-pressure applications.
In these applications, more than half and up to two-thirds of the injected
CO2 returns with the produced oil and is usually re-injected into the reservoir to
minimize operating costs. The remainder is trapped in the oil reservoir by various
means.
Miscible Processes:
contacts, forming a single oil-like liquid that can flow through the reservoir more
easily than the original crude. A variety of such processes have been developed
using different fluids that can mix with oil, including alcohols, carbon dioxide,
petroleum hydrocarbons such as propane or propane-butane mixtures, and
petroleum gases rich in ethane, propane, butane, and pentane.

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material must be used sparingly. In this process, a “slug,” which varies from 5 to
50 percent of the reservoir volume, is pushed through the reservoir by gas, water
(brine), or chemically treated brine to contact and displace the mixture of fluid and
oil.

early stages of development. Because of the high value of hydrocarbons and
chemicals derived from hydrocarbons, it is generally felt that such materials would
not make desirable injection fluids under current or future economic conditions.
For this reason, attention has turned to C02 as a solvent. Conditions for complete
mixing of C02 with crude oil depend on reservoir temperature and pressure and on
the chemical nature and density of the oil.
Although there are many possible CO2 sources, the largest source should be
naturally occurring deposits. Currently known sources of naturally occurring CO2
are described in publications.
The potential demand for C02 is such that geological exploration is in

progress. A pictorial representation of a C02 miscible flood is shown in figure
below. In the past, CO2 has sometimes, been injected into reservoirs in quantities
and at pressures less than those necessary to achieve complete miscibility, resulting
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in less oil recovery than when complete mixing is achieved. In this assessment,
quantities and pressures of CO2 injected are designed to achieve complete
miscibility.
Evaluation and improvement of sweep efficiency are important for miscible

displacement of medium viscosity oils. A high-pressure quarter 5-spot cell may be
used to conduct multi contact miscible water-alternating-gas (WAG) displacements
at reservoir conditions. A dead reservoir oil (78 cp) was found to be displaced by
ethane. The minimum miscibility pressure for ethane with the reservoir oil is
between 630 and 1000 psi. Gas flood followed by water flood improves the oil
recovery over just water flood alone in the quarter 5-spot. As the pressure
decreases, the gas flood oil recovery increases in the pressure range of 660-1380
psi for this under saturated viscous oil. WAG improves the oil recovery in the
quarter 5-spot over the continuous gas injection followed by water flood. WAG
injection slows down gas breakthrough. A decrease in the solvent amount lowers

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the oil recovery in WAG floods, but significantly higher amount of oil can be
recovered with 0.1 PV solvent injection over only water flood. Use of a horizontal
production well lowers the oil recovery slightly over the vertical production well
during WAG injection. Sweep efficiency is higher for lower reservoir pressure (in
this under saturated oil), for 9-spot pattern, and for 1:1 WAG injection compared to
continuous gas injection followed by water flood in the 5-spot model.

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12.THERMAL EOR PROCESSES
Heat injection oil recovery methods are used in fields with high-viscosity
oils which contain large quantities of both paraffin of a high crystallization
temperature and asphalt-resinous substances.
Since these oils in situ are almost immobile, disturbances in the
thermodynamic equilibrium of the formation-well system cause the deposition of
viscous substances which can plug up the bottom-hole zone completely.
This explains why wells in low-viscosity oil fields produce at extremely
small capacities, and the oil recovery factors range between a mere 0.1 and 0-.3.
Thermal bed stimulation makes it possible to melt the deposits of paraffin
and asphalt-resinous substances in rock pores, increase the wettability of rocks,
decrease the surface tension of fluids at the interfaces, induce the thermal
expansion of bed rocks and rock saturating fluids, and form the front of hot gases
and steam ahead of the heat carriers.
The following methods of thermal treatment of beds have found use or are
currently being tested.
1. Electric and fire (flame) heating of bottom holes.
2. Thermal steam treatment of formations.
3. Hot water injection into producing beds.
4. Oil recovery by in-situ combustion (heat wave process).
Electric bottom-hole heaters have found widespread usage. A detailed
description of electric heating methods will be given in Ch. 16. Fire heaters were
tested in the Borislav and Ishimbay oil fields, but have not been widely adopted.
Thermal steam treatment includes methods of both cyclic steam injection
into bottom-hole formation zones (see Ch. 16) and dispersed (repeating-pattern)
steam injection.
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Dispersed steam injection requires pumping steam into injection wells
distributed in a definite pattern over the field. A bank of hot steam-condensate and
the steam that subsequently results drives the oil out of the reservoir toward
adjacent producing wells. The steam decreases the oil viscosity, promotes salt
dissolution and melts out paraffin and other viscous substances.
Theory and practice indicate that heat treatment gives the best results at a
steam temperature of 200-210°C. An increase in the volume of injected steam
above the rated values may cause an untimely breakthrough of steam to the
producing wells.
Interruptions in the steam injection lead to a cooling of oil, an increase in its
viscosity, and a condensation of steam in the formation. This, in turn, leads to
additional filtration resistances and a decrease in effective permeability.
The spacing between oil producing and steam injection wells ranges from 25
to 120 m. A smaller spacing may encourage steam coning. Dispersed steam
injection is used in oil pools in which the thickness of a producing bed is not over
15 m and the depth of its occurrence does not exceed 1 000 m.
The hot water injection method finds use at the early stage of field
development, primarily where fields contain high-viscosity oils or oils with
paraffin of a high crystallization temperature. Should oil be driven out by cold
water, the flows of water would break through higher-permeability inter-layers or
sections of the formation. The temperature in overlying and underlying low-
permeability portions of the formation would then decrease, causing the paraffin to
settle in the pores, with the result that a large quantity of oil would be left unswept.
By this method, the hot water pumped into the injection wells to drive the oil
out toward the producing wells should have a higher temperature than the
crystallization temperature of paraffin. Since the continuous injection of hot water

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involves the large expense on water heating, a new cyclic method of hot water
injection is currently being developed.
This method consists in the intermittent injection of specified volumes of hot
and cold water into the bed. The hot water heats up the roof and the bottom of the
stratum; the cold water then forces the hot water into the bed and in the process,
becomes warmer. This method has passed laboratory tests and is likely to give
good results in field conditions.
The in-situ combustion process drives the oil in place by a heat wave
which moves through the bed and covers a comparatively small zone; the heat
results from the exothermic reaction between the oil and oxygen.
The in-situ combustion method that has received most of the study and
has already been put through many tests is the direct-flow method, by which the
combustion zone and the oxidant move in the same direction as depicted in Fig.
8.1. The oxidizing agent pumped into the bed to maintain combustion is the
atmospheric oxygen. Burned-out zone / forms between the injection well bottom
and combustion front 3.
If the process takes a normal course, oil-saturated thin layers 2 are left
unburnt at the top and bottom of zone / because the temperature there is below the
fire point of oil, and so combustion cannot occur.
Oil is driven out of the roof and bottom areas of the bed only by the hot
gaseous products of burning. Directly ahead of combustion front , there appears a
solid (coke-like) residual evolved from oil under high temperature.
In the coke region and ahead of it, light fractions of oil and water vapors
form evaporation zone 4 of a lower temperature. Further away comparatively wide
condensation zone 5 occurs, in which water and some oil left un-swept by hot
water are found in the boiling state under the partial pressures of these fluids.
Water is held both in the vaporous and the liquid state within the evaporation and
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condensation zones and also within the hot water zone 6 where the temperature is
below the boiling point of the fluids. The next zone in the direction of a producing
well is hot oil zone 7, ahead of which is zone 8 of the initial formation temperature.
As is obvious from the curves of Fig. 8.1, the temperature in the burned-out
zone rises to 400°C (curve 9) and above (curve 10), and remains at this level over
the entire burning zone. In the evaporation zone of light oil fractions and water the
temperature quickly drops to about 200°C and is maintained at this level over a
large distance.
The water and hydrocarbon vapors that have a higher pressure push the
banks of hot water and hot oil toward producing wells and thus displace oil from
the bed. In this way, the in-situ combustion method ensures a high oil recovery
under the joint effect oi hot water, vapors, and solvents.

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The in-situ combustion is practicable if the following conditions exist:
(1) The bed lies at a depth 50 to 1 000 m and the bed thickness is 3 to 15 m;
(2) Residual oil content is not below 50-60%;
(3) Initial degree of drowning does not exceed 40%;
(4) Bed porosity ranges from 12 to 43 % and more.
There are two methods of starting up a fire in formations: the method of
autogeneous ignition (inflammation) and the method of induced firing. The first
method applies to the fields containing rapidly oxidizable oils. The second method
uses electric heaters or air-gas mixture heaters placed at the bottom hole to fire the
formation by burning the mixture of air and hydrocarbon gas supplied separately
through two channels. After the combustion zone becomes stable, the supply of
hydrocarbon gas is gradually shut off, while air is steadily injected to maintain the
combustion.
In-situ combustion was tried on a large commercial scale in the high-
viscosity oil field of Pavlova Gora in 1966-1978. The process resulted in another
47076 tons of oil and increased the oil recovery factor from 13.3 % to 31 %.

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Combustion Processes. –
Combustion projects are technologically complex, and difficult to predict

and control. Interest in the process has declined within the last 6 years relative to
other EOR processes. Active field tests declined from 30 in 1970 to 21 in 1976.
Eight of the projects have been termed successful, nine unsuccessful and four have
not yet been evaluated.
Injection of hot air will cause ignition of oil within a reservoir. Although
some oil is lost by burning, the hot combustion product gases move ahead of the
combustion zone to distill oil and push it toward producing wells.
Air is injected through one pattern of wells and oil is produced from another
interlocking pattern of wells in a manner similar to waterflooding. This process is
referred to as fire flooding, in situ (in place) combustion, or forward combustion.
Although originally conceived to apply to very viscous crude oils not
susceptible to waterflooding, the method is theoretically applicable to a relatively
wide range of crude oils. An important modification of forward combustion is the
wet combustion process. Much of the heat generated in forward combustion is left
behind the burning front. This heat was used to raise the temperature of the rock to
the temperature of the combustion. Some of this heat may be recovered by
injection of alternate slugs of water and air.
The water is vaporized when it touches the hot formation. The vapor moves
through the combustion zone heating the oil ahead of it and assists the production
of oil. With proper regulation of the proportion of water and air, the combustion
can proceed at a higher thermal efficiency than under forward combustion without
water injection.
Combustion processes compete, at least technologically, with steam and some
other EOR processes, and the choice depends upon oil and reservoir

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characteristics. The wet combustion process is illustrated in figure 10. It is the
combustion process selected for technical and economic modeling study.

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13. STEAM INJECTION FOR EOR
Introduction :
Viscosity, a measure of a liquid’s ability to flow, varies widely among crude

oils. Some crudes flow like road tar, others as readily as water. High viscosity
makes oil difficult to recover with primary or secondary production methods.
The viscosity of most oils dramatically decreases as temperature increases,
and the purpose of all thermal oil-recovery processes is therefore to heat the oil to
make it flow or make it easier to drive with injected fluids.
An injected fluid may be steam or hot water (steam injection), or air (combustion
processes).
Steam Injection:
Steam injection is the most advanced and most widely used EOR process. It
has been successfully used in some reservoirs in California since the mid-1960’s.
There are two versions of the process: cyclic steam injection and steam drive.
In the first, high-pressure steam or steam and hot water is injected into a well
for a period of days or weeks. The injection is stopped and the reservoir is allowed
to “soak.” After a few days or weeks, the well is allowed to backflow to the
surface. Pressure in the producing well is allowed to decrease and some of the
water that condensed from steam during injection or that was injected as hot water
then vaporizes and drives heated oil toward the producing well.
When oil production has declined appreciably, the process is repeated.
Because of its cyclic nature, this process is occasionally referred to as the “huff and
puff” method.
The second method, steam drive or steam flooding, involves continuous
injection of steam or steam and hot water in much the same way that water is
Dr.G.G.Rajan
injected in water flooding. A reservoir or a portion thereof is developed with
interlocking patterns of injection and production wells.
During this process, a series of zones develop as the fluids move from
injection well to producing well. Nearest the injection well is a steam zone, ahead
of this is a zone of steam condensate (water), and in front of the condensed water is
a band or region of oil being moved by the water. The steam and hot water zone
together remove the oil and force it ahead of the water.
Cyclic steam injection is usually attempted in a reservoir before a full-scale
steam drive is initiated, partially as a means of determining the technical feasibility
of the process for a particular reservoir and partly to improve the efficiency of the
subsequent steam drive. A steam drive, where applicable, will recover more oil
than cyclic steam injection and is one of the five EOR methods used in the study of
the potential for EOR processes. Illustrations of the operation of cyclic steam
injection and steam drive are given in figures 8 and 9, respectively.

Dr.G.G.Rajan
Dr.G.G.Rajan
Dr.G.G.Rajan
For evaluating the economics of any EOR process details such as OOIP and
% recovered till observation period must be known. Oil characteristics do not
remain constant over it’s life cycle.
Hence variation in the crude characteristics such as API gravity, pour point,
paraffinicity , asphaltene content etc must be evaluated. Depending on these
properties only, the type of EOR process will be evaluated.

Dr.G.G.Rajan
Dr.G.G.Rajan
Step 1:
ESTIMATION OF ECONOMIC UNCERTAINTIES OF EOR PROJECT
Oil fields enhanced oil recovery (EOR) projects realizing in oil production
unit (OPU) is a risky activity. Primary sources of uncertainty of EOR projects are
geological (effective thickness of the productive stratum, current stratum pressure,
oil saturation, etc.), and other technology factors. Other sources of uncertainty for
OPU ( Oil Producing Unit) are financial and economic. It is necessary to note, that
though EOR costs according to the method used, economic considerations are the
costs directed on restoration of serviceability of EOR project investment and the
returns. Hence, expenses for EOR project should be considered as the investment
project and to do an estimation of economic efficiency of these costs, we may use
formulas for NPV , IRR etc.
Cost variables involved in the study are
o EOR project cost
o Variable costs ( Depending on selection of EOR process) during a
particular period
o Oil Produced during the period in tons
o Water produced during the period
o Re-injection cost for gas
o Water flooding quantity and cost over the period
o Interest rate on capital etc.
Once the NPV or IRR values are calculated, using Excel spread sheet or
other programs, it is possible to carry out what if scenario at selected conditions.
Applying the probability values for different scenario, the most practical values of
NPV & IRR may be calculated.

Dr.G.G.Rajan
From the Water to oil ratio trend, it is possible to develop a forecast on
future WOR which will show an uneconomical operation. In this particular case,
the % oil content at the end of fourth year of operation is = (1/16) * 100 = 6.3% . If
the same trend continues, the oil content will drop down to 1 % by 8th oy 9th year of
operation, which is uneconomical to operate.

Dr.G.G.Rajan
Statistics on EOR
It is important to collect EOR performance data from various sources as

given below. This information is very useful to identify the approximate utility
requirement for the selected process.

Dr.G.G.Rajan
Dr.G.G.Rajan
Dr.G.G.Rajan
Dr.G.G.Rajan
Dr.G.G.Rajan
Dr.G.G.Rajan
Dr.G.G.Rajan
Dr.G.G.Rajan
Thermal EOR production shows a decline in all cases, some even by 50%
and more. Hence TEOR production may not be a good process in many cases. But
if the crude oil in the reservoir is heavy and / or paraffinic, a combination of
thermal / CO2 EOR may yield results.

Dr.G.G.Rajan
Dr.G.G.Rajan
Dr.G.G.Rajan
Dr.G.G.Rajan
Thermal Miscible CO2 Chemical others Total
EOR EOR EOR
777 702 80.8 14.8 1574.6
49.34 44.58 5.13 0.95 100.0
CO2 - EOR data

Estimated % CO2 CO2 inj sp
OOIP EOR EOR EOR rate consumption CO2
million prodn million million
m3 m3/d m3 probable m3/d CO2 (m3/m3) source
gas
case 1 336 1430 27 8.04 1.7 1188.81 processing
domes
case 2 335 4880 56 16.72 12.1 2479.51 (natural)
gas
case 3 300 2210 22 7.33 4.4 1990.95 processing
1 ton CO2
= 509.41 m3

Dr.G.G.Rajan
% EOR process
5.13 0.95
49.34
44.58
1 2 3 4

Dr.G.G.Rajan
Decision flow diagram for Selection of EOR process
Data
OOIP million bbls / Crude gravity oAPI / Product oAPI
Poduction rate bbl/d Gas to Oil ratio / Water to oil ratio /
crude type (P/N/M) G/O ratio trend, Water/Oil ratio trend
/ Bubble point Pressure / Reservoir pressure data /
Re-injection streams
Y N
Reservoir pressure
Dropping down
Sustain Well
Increase gas Pressure &
Injection Production
Evaluate G/O, W/O
and API gravity
continuously.
Start injection at the
Pr.improved
required time.
Y N
Optimize inj rate W/O check

& process
> 50 or cut off

N
Y
Abandon / EOR Develop prodn

decision Forecast for EOR
decision

Dr.G.G.Rajan
Techno Economic Analysis for EOR process selection and decision making.
For selection of the EOR process, following economic parameters are to be

taken into consideration for each process. The starting point is the estimation of
project cost based on recovery potential for each process.
Prioritization of the process depends on the stage in which the reservoir is
operating – primary stage or secondary stage. At this point, reservoir pressure is of
utmost importance.
The difference between the existing well pressure and bubble point pressure
must be evaluated along with production rate from the reservoir to determine the
stage at which the well is operating.
Selection of EOR project is similar to any project evaluation, but
uncertainties in EOR recovery is one important factor that has to be evaluated
technically.
Example :
This example refers to an on going production well which has almost
reached the end of primary production stage. Following table shows the production
pattern from the reservoir over a period of time.
Crude Production data Primary stage

Annual cum
year oil kbbl/d water kbbl/d water to oil prodn prodn
1 37.00 45.90 1.24 13320 13320
2 26.40 59.90 2.27 9504 22824
3 20.80 65.40 3.14 7488 30312
4 17.10 67.20 3.93 6156 36468
5 14.60 69.40 4.75 5256 41724
6 12.60 70.70 5.61 4536 46260
7 11.00 72.00 6.55 3960 50220
OOIP 2.10 Billion bbls

Dr.G.G.Rajan
Observations :
API gravity of the remaining crude indicates, it is fairly heavy and gas
content is low compared to virgin crude. Since the production has reached
secondary / tertiary stage, Enhanced Oil Recovery has been proposed as given
above.
Based on the EOR production plan, the annual production rate by EOR and
CO2 requirement are is as given below.
Year Annual Prodn CO2 injection Year Annual Prodn CO2
million m3 million m3 million m3 injection m3
1 1.0000 2480 4 1.7812 4417.3
2 1.3000 3224 5 1.7812 4417.3
3 1.6000 3968 6 1.7812 4417.3
CO2 requirement for injection = 2480 m3/m3 EOR crude produced.

Dr.G.G.Rajan
Cost details:
CO2 cost at existing crude cost is taken as 3.5 $ / millionscf. i.e 123.5 $/million
m3
Project cost for CO2 pipe line including compressor stations : 100 million $
Operating cost ( power / manpower / maintenance ) 9.5 million $ /yr
Interest rate on capital 7.5 %
Other incidental costs 0.5 million $ /yr
Cost Data for EOR evaluation
EOR CO2 cost of operation interest EOR

year of prodn injection CO2 & on capital total
crude million in capital
operation million m3 m3 million$ maint cost (avg) recovery costs
1 1.0000 2480.0 0.3063 10.0000 7.5000 10.0000 27.8063
2 1.3000 3224.0 0.3982 10.0000 6.7500 10.0000 27.1482
3 1.6000 3968.0 0.4900 10.0000 6.0000 10.0000 26.4900
4 1.7812 4417.3 0.5455 10.0000 5.2500 10.0000 25.7955
5 1.7812 4417.3 0.5455 10.0000 4.5000 10.0000 25.0455
6 1.7812 4417.3 0.5455 10.0000 3.7500 10.0000 24.2955
7 1.5000 3720.0 0.4594 10.0000 3.0000 10.0000 23.4594
8 1.3200 3273.6 0.4043 10.0000 2.2500 10.0000 22.6543
9 0.9500 2356.0 0.2910 10.0000 1.5000 10.0000 21.7910
10 0.6500 1612.0 0.1991 10.0000 0.7500 10.0000 20.9491
basis : crude price 100 614.7
$/bbl $/m3
1 m3 = 6.15 bbl
Total cost includes all the costs associated with EOR project alone. Since an
original investment has been already made during exploration project, that capital
recovery portion must also be included in the total costing as given below

Dr.G.G.Rajan
Profitability calculation for base case EOR ( million $)
year of operating base capital profit from

operation income recovery EOR operation
1 614.7 600.0 -13.11
2 799.1 600.0 171.96
3 983.5 600.0 357.03
4 1094.9 600.0 469.11
5 1094.9 600.0 469.86
6 1094.9 600.0 470.61
7 922.1 600.0 298.59
8 811.4 600.0 188.75
9 584.0 600.0 -37.83
10 399.6 600.0 -221.39
Next step evaluates internal rate of return on capital under various scenarios
as given below..
EOR Economic Analysis - Miscible CO2
IRR calculation (base
case) case 2 case 3 case 4 case 5
oprtg
year million $ million $ million $ million $ million $
- -
1 -100.00 -120.00 120.00 -120.00 120.00
-
2 -13.11 -47.34 -78.08 -108.81 139.55
3 171.96 128.66 88.70 48.75 8.79
4 357.03 304.65 255.48 206.30 157.13
5 469.11 411.31 356.57 301.82 247.08
6 469.86 412.21 357.47 302.72 247.98
7 470.61 413.11 358.37 303.62 248.88
8 298.59 249.89 203.79 157.68 111.58
9 188.75 145.73 105.16 64.59 24.02
-
10 -37.83 -69.32 -98.52 -127.72 156.92
- -
11 -221.39 -243.52 263.50 -283.48 303.46
IRR in
% 119% 88% 71% 54% 36%
Note: case 2 : Capital cost +20 %, operating income lower by 5%
case 3 : Capital cost +20 %, operating income lower by 10%
case 4 : Capital cost +20 %, operating income lower by 15%
case 5 : Capital cost +20 %,
operating income lower by 20%

Dr.G.G.Rajan
It may be noted that in this case, IRR on investment in EOR is as high as 36
% and profitable even under worst conditions.
Same methodology may be applied for other EOR processes and the best
one may be opted for implementation. Following figure shows the project viability
based on the above data.
IRR %
140
120
100
80
% IRR
60
40
20
0
base case 2 case 3 case 4 case 5
operating scenario
IRR %
For a successful EOR implementation, a test well must be tried and establish
the optimum CO2 pressure for the operation. Higher CO2 pressure increases the
compression cost and the operating cost as well.
A typical case of impact of CO2 operating pressure on recovery is shown
below for a successful case.

Dr.G.G.Rajan
Minimum Miscibility Pressure of CO2 > bubble point pressure/

Dr.G.G.Rajan
EOR recovery %
100.0
90.0
80.0
yield %
70.0
60.0
50.0
40.0
70.85 85.07 85.21 91.34
well pressure
EOR recovery %

Dr.G.G.Rajan
Conclusion :
EOR decision and choice of process is strictly based on field evaluation tests
and Laboratory tests.
Crude yield pattern should be evaluated for all EOR processes of which CO2
injection and Thermal EOR are more populat.
In specific cases, other processes may be adopted. For all evaluation, order
of magnitude of investment, variable costs and O&M costs must be evaluated as
shown above.

Dr.G.G.Rajan

Quantitative Decision Making For Enhanced Oil Recovery: (3 Day Training Program

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QUANTITATIVE DECISION

MAKING FOR ENHANCED OIL

Date & Venue

EOR Decision making program

EOR Decision making program

1. INTRODUCTION TO OIL AND GAS PRODUCTION

¾ Identifying oil and gas potential

¾ Stages of oil recovery ( Primary / Secondary / tertiary recovery)

¾ Definition of EOR in Oil production stage..

¾ Displacement forces in the reservoir

4.MACROSCOPIC FLUID DISPLACEMENT IN RESERVOIR

¾ Reservoir fluid PVT properties; rock properties

5. FACTORS COMMON TO ALL INJECTION METHODS

EOR Decision making program

Day 2 28th August 2008

6. WELL TEST ANALYSIS

7..MISCIBLE DISPLACEMENT METHODS

¾ Micellar/polymer flood, Surfactant flood

11. MISCIBLE GAS FLOODING

Day 3 – 29th August 2008

12.THERMAL EOR PROCESSES

¾ Effect of temperature on oil viscosity, reservoir fluid and rock properties

13. STEAM INJECTION FOR EOR

14. ECONOMICS OF ENHANCED OIL RECOVERY

¾ Costing for Liquid / Gas / Steam / Chemical flooding

EOR Decision making program

EOR Decision making program

a. Identifying oil and gas potential .

Oil reservoir rocks (red) and natural gas (blue)

These movements of the Earth include:

EOR Decision making program

EOR Decision making program

In seismic surveys, a shock wave is created by the following:

EOR Decision making program

Because water is used in drilling, there must be a source of water nearby. If

Setting Up the Rig

Mechanical system - driven by electric motors

EOR Decision making program

EOR Decision making program

Mud circulation in the hole

EOR Decision making program

EOR Decision making program

EOR Decision making program

After the rig is removed, a pump is placed on the well head.

Pump on an oil well

EOR Decision making program

EOR Decision making program

New Drilling Technologies

Blowouts and Fires

EOR Decision making program

EOR Decision making program

Formation evaluation tools

EOR Decision making program

EOR Decision making program

Mud logging (or Wellsite Geology) is a well logging process in which

EOR Decision making program

EOR Decision making program

EOR Decision making program

Neutron porosity logging tools contain an Americium-Beryllium neutron

EOR Decision making program

Lithology logs - SP and Gamma Ray

EOR Decision making program