DECLINE CURVE ANALYSIS

Compiled by : SACHIN NAMBIAR

Contact No: 9067111274

DCA is a graphical representation of the production data used for analysing declining production rate,
forecasting future performance of oil & gas wells and Estimated Ultimate Recovery ( EUR)
determination.

Decline in q may be as a function of declining Pr, change in volume of produced fluids.

Note : Fitting a line through production data and assuming that the trend will continue in the future
remains the basis for DCA.

ASSUMPTIONS

1. Drainage area is constant.

2. Well Produce at a constant Flowing Bottom hole Pressure (FBHP)
3. Skin factor is not changing with time
4. Pseudo-steady state (PSS) flow regime / Boundary dominated flow; Not applicable for
Transient Flow regime

LIMITATIONS

1. Any past activities like change in the choke size or Work-over jobs ( W/O) will affect the future
trend.
2. In absence of stabilized production trends the technique is expected to give huge errors. i.e.
You should have data for large number of years;

TYPES OF DECLINE CURVES ( as per Arps’)

1. Exponential (b=0)
2. Hyperbolic ( 0<b<1)
3. Harmonic ( b=1)
Where
q = Current production rate
qi = initial produciton rate
a = decline rate (d)
Q = Cumulative production
t = time
b = hyperbolic constant

Decline Rate (d)

Defined as the negative slope of the curve representing the natural logarithm of the production rate q
vs. time t or :

Hyperbolic constant (b)

The rate of change of the decline rate w.r.t time. This means that “b” is the second derivative of
production rate with respect to time.
GRAPHICAL REPRESENTATION

Flow rate against Time (q vs t):

 Provides future profiles directly.

 Decline Rate (d) can be found

Flow rate against cumulative production

(q vs Q):
• Provide recovery estimates at a specific
economic limit.
𝐸𝑈𝑅
• Recovery Factor (RF) = 𝑂𝑂𝐼𝑃