Is High-Pressure Air Injection (HPAI)
Simply a Flue-Gas Flood?
A.R. Montes, University of Calgary
D. Gutiérrez, Computer Modelling Group Ltd.
R.G. Moore, S.A. Mehta, M.G. Ursenbach, University of Calgary
Abstract
High-pressure air injection (HPAI) is an enhanced oil recovery
(EOR) process in which compressed air is injected into a deep,
light-oil reservoir, with the expectation that the oxygen in the in-
jected air will react with a fraction of the reservoir oil at an ele-
vated temperature to produce carbon dioxide.
Over the years, HPAI has been considered a simple flue-gas
flood, giving little credit to the thermal drive as a production
mechanism. The truth is that, although early production during a
HPAI process is mainly due to re-pressurization and gasflood ef-
fects, once a pore volume of air has been injected the combustion
front becomes the main driving mechanism.
This paper presents laboratory and field evidence of the pres-
ence of a thermal front during HPAI operations, and of its ben-
eficial impact on oil production. Production and injection data
from the Buffalo Field, which comprises the oldest HPAI proj-
ects currently in operation, were gathered and analyzed for this
purpose. These HPAI projects definitely do not behave as simple
immiscible gasfloods.
This study shows that a HPAI project has the potential to yield
higher recoveries than a simple immiscible gasflood. Further-
more, it gives recommendations about how to operate the pro-
cess to take advantage of its full capabilities.
Introduction
High-Pressure Air Injection (HPAI) is an emerging technology
for the enhanced oil recovery (EOR) of light oils that has proven
to be a valuable process, especially in deep, thin, low-permeability
reservoirs(1–7).
A number of successful high-pressure air injection projects in
light oil reservoirs have been documented in the literature(8–10).
Most of these projects have been operating for many years, at-
testing to their technical and economic success.
The improvement in recovery of light oil by HPAI involves a
combination of complex processes, each contributing to the overall
recovery. These processes include flue gas sweeping, field re-pres-
surization, oil swelling, viscosity reduction, stripping of the lighter
components of the oil, and thermal effects. Early production
during the HPAI process is related to re-pressurization and gas-
flood effects; hence, the influence of the thermal zone is secondary
during the early life of an injector. The oil displaced directly by the
thermal front will depend on the effectiveness of the generated flue
gas on oil displacement from outside the thermal region.
For many years, there has been some discussion regarding the
effective driving mechanisms associated with the HPAI process;
some authors have assumed it is essentially attributable to the in-
situ generated flue gas displacement and consequently the process
56 Journal of Canadian Petroleum Technology
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is analogous to a flue-gas injection, while others recognize the
thermal nature of the process.
Clara et al.(11) explained the air injection technique applied to
light-oil reservoirs and proposed a laboratory strategy for evalua-
tion of an air injection project. It was stated that regardless of the
oxidation zones, the air injection process in a light oil reservoir is
comparable to a flue-gas injection process. Hunedi et al.(12) pre-
sented results of an exhaustive EOR screening based on successful
field trials and physics of the oil recovery mechanisms for each
method, with the possibility to be applied in eight oil fields (30.2 to
41.3ºAPI) in the Euphrates Graben. Air injection studies were not
recommended for the mentioned fields. It was stated that because
the flue gas front is generally far ahead of the thermal combustion
front, the thermal effects on production were negligible and only
immiscible gas displacement would be expected. Consequently,
the gain of the process could be modelled at a field scale by con-
sidering only the flue-gas sweeping. Further reported simulations
studies that evaluated the feasibility of field implementation have
modelled it as a flue gas process. Sakthikumar et al.(13) simulated
air injection process as an immiscible nitrogen flood, Glandt et
al.(14) modelled the process as an isothermal flue-gas flood and Mo-
hiuddin et al.(15) simulated air injection process as a nitrogen injec-
tion process. Even though those simulations were rightly seen as
a conservative case, they neglect the “bulldozing” effect described
by Gutiérrez et al.(16) and could predict neither liquid natural gas
production nor thermal effects related to the combustion process.
Some authors have tried to determine the differences between
air injection and flue-gas injection through reservoir simulation.
Yannimaras et al.(17) and later Fassihi(18) compared the oil response
to flue-gas injection to that of air injection. They concluded that
the air injection response was identical to the flue-gas injections re-
sponse up to approximately 2 hydrocarbon pore volumes injected
(HCPVI). Past this point, the displaced oil by the thermal front
broke through, resulting in a lower gas/oil ratio (GOR) accompa-
nied by higher oil recovery. When air is injected, flue gas is gen-
erated in situ and it interacts with the oil ahead of the combustion
front; the degree of swelling and stripping determines the volume
of oil recovered when flue gas is displacing the oil. Thus, until the
oil bank breakthrough in the combustion simulation, the oil ahead
of the combustion front was subjected essentially to the same flue-
gas mixture, which resulted in the same oil recovery. However, the
advantage of injecting air over flue gas is its ability to mobilize the
unrecovered oil after flue-gas displacement. It was concluded that
the overall oil recovery in the air injection process in light oil res-
ervoirs is due to the addition of displaced oil by both the flue gas
and the burn front. Kuhlman(19) conducted a study with the pur-
pose of comparing HPAI performance with equation of state (EoS)
black oil and thermal simulations of the same problems to deter-
mine where each could be used and the performance limitations
of HPAI. The simulations in which reservoir gas was injected in-
dicate that the black-oil simulation does not predict what happens
behind the oil bank well; production from the black-oil model was
only 70% of that predicted by either the EoS or thermal models.
One important conclusion was that black-oil models can predict
the response to gas injection but should only be used as scouting
tools because the results could be serendipitous. De Zwart et al.(20)
conducted numerical simulations in a 3D model, and compared
isothermal EoS-simulations, isothermal K-value simulations and
multicomponent combustion simulations in a light oil reservoir
(36°API). It was shown that isothermal K-values and combustion
results were similar in the first 2 years, but after that, the produc-
tion response of the combustion case started to deviate from the
isothermal case, because of the combustion front approaching the
production well. In the combustion case there was hardly any oil
remaining in the swept area, while the flue-gas case resulted in a
maximum of 60% gas saturation. Clearly, the results illustrated the
importance of including the thermal effects in the prediction of the
HPAI process.
Laboratory experiments have shown that the HPAI process
is quite similar to a gas-injection process only before gas break-
through, and after this point, the HPAI process still has the poten-
tial to recover additional oil through thermal effects, which cannot
be recovered by a simple immiscible displacement. Moreover,
field production history from the oldest HPAI project currently in
operation(21) suggests that the process is not performing as an im-
miscible gasflood and thermal effects are having a positive impact
on the performance of the field.
This paper intends to show that HPAI process is not merely a
flue-gas displacement and should not be treated as a gas-injection
process, especially after 1 pore volume (PV) of air has been in-
jected into the reservoir. Experimental and field data will be used
to support this statement.
HPAI Process Overview
HPAI is defined as an EOR process in which compressed air is
injected into a high pressure, light-oil reservoir, with the expecta-
tion that the oxygen in the injected air will react with a fraction of
the reservoir oil at an elevated temperature to produce CO2. The re-
sulting flue-gas mixture, which is primarily CO2 and N2, provides
the main mobilizing force to the oil downstream of the reaction re-
gion, sweeping it to production wells. The gas/oil mixture may be
immiscible, or partly or completely miscible. In many situations,
especially in tertiary recovery operations, the combustion zone it-
self provides a critical part of the sweep mechanism in terms of in-
cremental recovery.
During the combustion process between oxygen and oil, two
possible reaction pathways exist: the first is referred to as “bond
scission” reaction and the second is called the “oxygen addition”
reaction(22). During bond scission reactions, the oxygen reacts with
the hydrocarbon molecules to principally produce carbon dioxide,
water and energy; in other words, these are traditional complete
combustion reactions. In many of the light oil reservoirs these bond
scission reactions occur in the 250 – 300°C range, while in heavier
oils bond scission reactions are more likely to occur above 450°C.
During oxygen addition reactions, oxygen atoms are chemically
bound into the molecular structure of the oil, producing various
oxygenated compounds, such as hydroperoxides, aldehydes, ke-
tones and acids. These compounds tend to further react and polym-
erize with each other, forming heavier, less desirable oil fractions.
To compound the problem, because oxygen is being removed from
the gas phase to the liquid phase, and is not replaced with CO2,
the pore pressure where the oxygen addition reactions occur will
February 2010, Volume 49, No. 2 57
drop below that of the flowing gas, which promotes trapping of
the oil phase. Oxygen addition reactions seem to dominate at tem-
peratures below approximately 150°C for lighter oils and are the
dominant reaction mode for heavy oils at temperatures of less than
300°C.
Avoiding operation in an oxygen addition reaction mode is
highly desirable. Fortunately, for many high-pressure, light oils,
bond scission reactions are the preferential reaction path, and air
injection processes tend to operate there quite readily under a wide
range of operating conditions(22).
Air injection into light oil reservoirs offers technical oppor-
tunities for improved oil recovery in many candidate reservoirs;
potential benefits include rapid reservoir pressurization, flue-gas
sweeping, excellent displacement efficiency and mobilization of
extra combustion oil, flue-gas stripping of the reservoir oil, and
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oil swelling mainly by the in-situ generated carbon dioxide. More-
over, for injection into high-pressure, high-temperature reservoirs,
additional benefits may accrue(17), such as spontaneous oil ignition,
complete oxygen utilization and near-miscibility of the generated
flue gas and the oil.
One of the unique features of the combustion process is the self-
correcting nature of the combustion zone, owing to (1) the rapid
mobilization of oil into the downstream pores, which temporarily
reduces the gas permeability and redirects the air flow, and (2) salt
precipitation from the formation water in the steam zone, which
promotes better volumetric sweep of the reservoir. The overall
conformance downstream of the combustion zone will, of course,
be subject to gas override, as with any other gas injection process.
Early production during the HPAI process is related to re-pres-
surization and gasflood effects; hence, the influence of the thermal
zones is secondary during the early life of an injector (i.e., prior
to 1 PV of air injected). The recovery of the oil displaced directly
by the so-called “combustion front” will depend on the effective-
ness of the generated flue gas on oil displacement from outside the
thermal region. If oil displacement from the regions not directly af-
fected by the thermal zone is high, the air/oil ratios associated with
the displacement of oil by the combustion zone will be so high that
air injection to that portion of the reservoir will be stopped long be-
fore the combustion front has advanced any appreciable distance
within the reservoir(22).
Fundamental Differences Between Gas-
Injection-Based Processes
This section discusses some of the fundamental differences be-
tween air injection (combustion) and immiscible and miscible gas
injection as perceived by the authors.
100
80
Oil Recovery, %IOIP
60
40
Miscible Gas Flood
Immiscible Gas Flood
20
Air Injection (Combustion)
Gates and Ramey
0
0 1 2 3
Pore Volumes Gas Injected
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
Burned Volume (Fraction)
FIGURE 1: Theoretical behaviour of gas displacements.
 100
Inert Gas Flood Air Injection Inert Gas Purge
Oil Recovery, %IOIP 80
60
40
CF-G1 (16% CO2)
CF-G2 (30% CO2)
20 ST-G1 (16% CO2)
ST-G2 (30% CO2)
CT-Air (21% O2)
0 0
0.0 1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0
Pore Volumes Injected, Fraction
FIGURE 2: Gas displacements for Oil A.
In Figure 1, the theoretical behaviour of oil recovery versus PV
of gas injected for miscible and immiscible gas displacements as
well as air injection is presented. Also, curves of recovery versus
burned volume for combustion displacements are shown.
In a miscible displacement process, the oil in the reservoir could
be displaced from the rock with a high degree of efficiency. This
occurs because, during the miscible drive, the capillary forces be-
tween the displaced oil and displacing fluid reduce to essentially
zero; thus, a large ultimate recovery may be expected provided
that most of the porous media is contacted by the injection gas(23).
Under ideal conditions, a miscible displacement can achieve
approximately 90% or greater oil recovery after 1 PV of gas
injected.
An immiscible gas displacement yields very low microscopic
displacement efficiency. Part of the crude oil in the places con-
tacted by the displacing fluid is trapped as isolated drops, stringers
or pendular rings(24). When this condition is reached, relative per-
meability to oil is reduced essentially to zero and continued injec-
tion of the displacing fluid is ineffective because the fluid simply
flows around the trapped oil. The oil does not move in the flowing
stream because of capillary forces, which prevent oil deforma-
tion and passage through constrictions in the pore passages. As
shown in Figure 1, there is a gradual increase in oil recovery until
gas breakthrough (i.e., before one pore volume of gas has been in-
jected). After this point, very little oil can be recovered.
For air-injection processes, the solid red straight line in Figure 1
represents a combustion frontal displacement and the blue curved
line represents the oil-recovery/volume-burned curve developed
by Gates and Ramey(25). Contrary to an immiscible displacement,
air injection is able to recover a significant additional quantity of
oil after 1 PV of air has been injected. This is because recovery
from a combustion type of process is dependent on the fraction of
reservoir volume burned, and this fraction typically is still small
when 1 PV of air has been injected.
Additional to the oil recovery, another factor to take into ac-
count for gas flood processes is the GOR. For an immiscible gas
displacement, which is what most flue-gas floods would be, when
gas breakthrough occurs, because of the greater gas mobility as
compared with oil mobility, the gas will “block” the oil produc-
tion and the GOR will tend to increase in a linear or exponential
manner. For combustion tube tests the GOR behaviour is similar
to that of immiscible displacement. However, there is a point when
gas production will tend to decrease or remain constant while oil
production will tend to increase. This happens because the com-
bustion front is moving the oil bank formed ahead of it to the pro-
duction end causing a reduction in gas mobility. This “unusual”
GOR trend seen in laboratory has also been seen in field cases and
will be discussed later in the paper.
58 Journal of Canadian Petroleum Technology
100
Inert Gas Flood Air Injection Inert Gas Purge
80
Oil Recovery, %IOIP
60
40
CF-G1 (16% CO2)
CF-G2 (30% CO2)
20 ST-G1 (16% CO2)
ST-G2 (30% CO2)
CT-Air (22% O2)
5.0 0.0 1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0
Pore Volumes Injected, Fraction
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FIGURE 3: Gas displacements for Oil B.
Is HPAI Simply a Gasflood Process?
It is well known that the combustion process associated with
air-injection-based EOR processes yields very high microscopic
displacement efficiency. Laboratory studies and cores taken from
post-burn regions of fields show a complete absence of hydrocar-
bons in the regions swept by the combustion zone; approximately
5 to 10% of the oil in place is consumed as fuel while the rest is
mobilized and available for capture(22).
Nevertheless, for the case of light oils, it is generally assumed
that the thermal component has a minor effect on the ultimate oil
recovery and the process can be treated as a flue-gas flood. This is
mostly because of the fact that the combustion front can only ad-
vance after heating the bulk volume of rock (slow process) and by
the time 1 PV of air has been injected, only a small fraction of the
reservoir has been burned.
This section presents laboratory and field evidence of the pres-
ence of a thermal front during HPAI operations, and its beneficial
impact on oil recovery.
Laboratory Evidence
As part of many studies from currently producing reservoirs,
the In Situ Combustion Research Group (ISCRG) at the University
of Calgary has performed several slim-tube tests and corefloods
at reservoir conditions, using flue gas at different proportions of
carbon dioxide and nitrogen, as well as several combustion tube
tests on the same reservoirs. Although there are certain differ-
ences between these three kinds of tests (i.e., porous media used),
a comparison between combustion tube tests, slim-tube tests, and
coreflood tests serves as good means to visualize the differences
between the gas-injection processes.
Details of the equipment, schematic and experimental set-up of
the performed slim tube tests and coreflood tests have been de-
scribed in work by Shokoya et al.(26–29).
A combustion tube test is conducted by packing the tube with
crushed core material saturated with methanol, installing the ther-
mocouples, heaters, and insulation, and mounting the tube into the
pressure jacket. Air is passed through the packed core at ambient
temperature and pressure to remove the methanol. A vacuum is ap-
plied for enough time to extract the air and then the sandpack is
saturated with reservoir brine. Porosity and permeability are de-
termined and oil is then injected to drive the brine to an immo-
bile saturation. The packed core is brought to reservoir conditions
and turned vertically. The oil-saturated combustion tube is flooded
with inert gas (nitrogen or helium) until no more oil is recovered.
This inert gas injection serves to simulate the flue-gas front pre-
ceding the steam and combustion zones during in-situ combustion.
Finally, air injection starts with the expectation to recover the addi-
tional oil left behind by the immiscible gas displacement.
 Table 1: Fluid properties. Table 2: Conditions For combustion tube tests.

Oil A Oil B Oil A Oil B

Density (g/cm3) 0.8207 @ 23 ºC 0.8385 @ 15 ºC
4.2 @ 35 ºC 9.21 @ 15 ºC
Viscosity (cp) 2.94 @ 40 ºC 4.05 @ 25 ºC
  2.94 @ 40 ºC
Asphaltenes (% by mass) 0.16 0.24
Specific gravity @ 15 ºC 0.8265 0.8385
API gravity @ 15 ºC (ºAPI) 39.7 37.3
Porosity (%) 48.1 42.6
Permeability (mD) 9,000 1,700
Run pressure (kPa) 14,576 12,508
Pre-heat temperature (ºC) 116 77
O2 concentration (mol %) 21 22.29
Stable injection air flux (m3(ST)/m2h) 45.5 30.8
Initial oil saturation (%) 53.9 46.2
Initial water saturation (%) 46.1 53.8
Initial gas saturation (%) 0.0 0.0

Figures 2 and 3 illustrate curves of recovery, as percentage of tube tests. During inert gas injection, all tests exhibit a monotoni-
oil in place, versus pore volumes of gas injected (flue gas or air) cally increasing GOR, but the trend in the combustion tube test
for slim tube tests, coreflood tests, and combustion tube tests for during air injection is different. The point when the GOR curves
two different oils referenced in the literature as Oil A and Oil B(29). change their concavity is an indication that the thermal front is dis-

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Two flue gases referenced as Gas 1 (G1) and Gas 2 (G2) were used
in the slim tube tests and coreflood tests. Gas 1 corresponds to a
mixture of 16% CO2, 1% CO and 83% N2; while Gas 2 is a mixture
of 30% CO2, 1% CO and 69% N2. Slim tube tests and coreflood
tests were performed at 27 MPa and 116ºC for Oil A and 17 MPa
and 80.6ºC for Oil B. Combustion tests were performed at 14 MPa
and 116ºC for Oil A and 14.2 MPa and 77ºC for Oil B.
In Table 1 the fluid properties of the oils A and B are shown,
and Table 2 provides the initial conditions for the two combustion
tube tests.
Slim tube tests and coreflood tests were performed at higher
pressures than the combustion tests, and higher CO2 concentra-
tions than exhibited by combustion gases, and yet neither of the
mixtures exhibited miscibility with the oil. This allows concluding
that the flue gas generated during the combustion tests (i.e., less
than 16% of CO2) is immiscible with the native oil at the tested
pressure.
It can be seen that slim tube tests resulted in higher recovery
than coreflood tests for the same flue gas and, as it would be ex-
pected, the recovery with flue gas 2 (30% CO2) was greater than
placing a significant quantity of oil. This effect becomes clearer by
looking at the gas/liquid ratio (GLR) curves illustrated in Figures
4 and 5. It is evident that the thermal front is mobilizing the liquid
phases (i.e., oil and water) very efficiently and reducing the fin-
gering of the gas phase, resulting in a relatively flat GLR.
Although thermal effects have the ability to produce “extra” oil
beyond that of a flue-gas flood (i.e., 20 to 30% in these combus-
tion tube tests), one must be aware that more pore volumes of air
(oxygen) need to be injected in order to burn a larger portion of
the reservoir.
Finally, it must be said that in general the oil industry has al-
ways acknowledged the fundamental differences in the physics of
the processes related to combustion and flue-gas displacements.
However, due precisely to the “extreme” amount of air that would
need to be injected to see any appreciable impact from the thermal
effects, it was considered that, at a field scale, the process would
reduce to a simple flue-gas flood. The next section explains that it
is not necessarily the case, and that the assumption may not hold.
Cumulative GOR, GLR, m3(ST)/m3(ST)

Inert Gas Flood Air Injection Inert Gas Purge

the recovery obtained with flue gas 1 (16% CO2). At 1 PV of gas 1,200
injected, the recovery was between 40% and 55% for Oil A and
between 30% and 45% for Oil B for both slim tube and coreflood
tests, respectively. At this point, the recovery obtained with the 900
combustion tube tests was under immiscible gas injection with ei-
ther helium or nitrogen.
Past 1 PV of gas injected, the incremental oil produced during 600
the slim tube and coreflood tests is negligible, whereas the com-
bustion tests start to deliver oil under air injection. This “extra” oil
is due to thermal effects from the combustion front. This clearly 300 CF-G1 (16% CO2) CF-G2 (16% CO2)
confirms that the combustion front has the ability to mobilize the ST-G1 (16% CO2) ST-G2 (16% CO2)
residual oil to immiscible gas injection to allow it to be produced CT-Air - GOR CT-Air - GLR
by the flue-gas drive. 0
Figures 4 and 5 show the cumulative GOR obtained for Oil A 0.0 1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0
and Oil B in the slim tube tests, coreflood tests, and combustion Pore Volumes Injected, Fraction
FIGURE 5: Cumulative gas oil ratio for Oil B.
800
Cumulative GOR, GLR, m3(ST)/m3(ST)

Inert Gas Flood Air Injection Inert Gas Purge

24 WBRRU 32-25 SBRRU 24-36 BRRU 12-22H 24
22 22
CO2 Content, molar percent
CO2 Content, molar percent

20 20
600
18 18
16 16
14 14
400 12 12
10 10
8 8
6 6
200 4 4
CF-G1 (16% CO2) CF-G2 (16% CO2)
2 2
ST-G1 (16% CO2) ST-G2 (16% CO2)
0 0
CT-Air - GOR CT-Air - GLR Dec-99 Dec-00 Dec-01 Dec-02 Dec-03 Dec-04 Dec-05 Dec-06 Dec-07
0
0.0 1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0 Date of Composition Measurement
of Produced Gas - Well Data
Pore Volumes Injected, Fraction
FIGURE 4: Cumulative gas oil ratio for Oil A. FIGURE 6: Measured CO2 content in produced gas-field data.
February 2010, Volume 49, No. 2 59
 24 1,000 1,000,000
22

Gas Production, MSCFD

CO2 Content, molar percent
20 100,000

Oil Production, BOPD

18

WOR, STB/STB
GOR, SCF/STB
100 10,000
16
14
1,000
12
10 10 100
8
6 10
4
1 1
2

Jan-99

Jan-00

Jan-01

Jan-02

Jan-03

Jan-04

Jan-05

Jan-06

Jan-07
0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Date
Time During Combustion Test, hours
Oil Production Gas Production GOR WOR
FIGURE 7: Measured CO2 content in produced gas lab data.

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FIGURE 10: Production performance of Well SBRRU 23-26H.

combustion process on the production performance of the field,

some evidence of the presence of a combustion front inside the res-
ervoir will be presented.
Figure 6 presents the molar content of CO2 in produced gas
samples taken from three wells in the Buffalo Field, while Figure
7 exhibits the CO2 content in the gas produced obtained from the
combustion tube of Oil B, discussed in the previous section.
A presence in excess of 12% CO2 is a good indication of com-
bustion as the primary reaction path. From the two figures, it can
be seen that not only are the produced gas compositions above
12% CO2 (this is consistent all across the field), but the field data
correlates quite well with the lab results; that is, the content of CO2
in the produced gas is low at the initial stages and increases with
time until it stabilizes at combustion-like values (i.e., 12 – 21%).
On the other hand, Figure 8 illustrates a thin section photomi-
FIGURE 8: Thin section photomicrograph from Well BRRU 14-22R @
8,609.40 ft.
crograph of a post-burn core obtained from well BRRU 14-22R16.
This well was a replacement injector drilled 145 ft from the old
Field Evidence injector BRRU 14-22. The image exhibits part of a reservoir zone
that is almost absent of hydrocarbons (black spots) and has a high
HPAI has recovered incremental oil in waterflooded fields such content of halite. The core analysis revealed an oil saturation of
as the Sloss field(9), which shows that HPAI reduces the residual 4.9%, which suggests a very high microscopic displacement effi-
oil saturation below that of water injection. Nevertheless, some ciency that cannot be achieved by flue gases (immiscible gas injec-
people usually argue that the “extra” recovery is due to the flue tion) alone. The presence of halite is also an indication of the high
gases sweeping areas not contacted by the water injected (i.e. top temperatures experienced by the rock.
of the reservoir).
This section of the paper presents production data from Buf- Is the Combustion Process Impacting the Production
falo Red River Unit (BRRU) and South Buffalo Red River Unit Performance of the Buffalo Field?
(SBRRU) in the Buffalo field(7, 21), which shows that the oil is ac-
The other source of argument is whether the thermal front can
tually burning and suggests that the combustion front is having a
actually enhance the performance of the HPAI process.
favourable impact on the production performance of the field.
Although some of the production wells in the field experience
Is the Oil Burning? a typical gasflood behaviour (i.e., GOR monotonically increasing
after gas breakthrough), such as the well BRRU 14-9 shown in
One of the common questions people ask is: “Is the oil really Figure 9, that is not always the case. In this particular well, gas
burning?” Before attempting to suggest any possible benefit of the production starts to increase rapidly while oil production declines
1,000 80,000 1,000 75,000
Gas Production, MSCFD

Gas Production, MSCFD

Oil Production, BOPD

Oil Production, BOPD

100 60,000
GOR, SCF/STB

GOR, SCF/STB

100 50,000

10 40,000

10 25,000
1 20,000

0 0 1 0
Jan-59

Jan-63

Jan-67

Jan-71

Jan-75

Jan-79

Jan-83

Jan-87

Jan-91

Jan-95

Jan-99

Jan-03

Jan-07

Jan-81

Jan-83

Jan-85

Jan-87

Jan-89

Jan-91

Jan-93

Jan-95

Jan-97

Jan-99

Jan-01

Jan-03

Jan-05

Jan-07

Date Date
Oil Production Gas Production GOR Oil Production Gas Production GOR

FIGURE 9: Production performance of Well BRRU 14-9. FIGURE 11: Production performance of Well BRRU 34-20.
60 Journal of Canadian Petroleum Technology
steadily. In a conventional gasflood behaviour, this trend would the field (~50%)(21); hence, as pointed out by Gutiérrez et al.(7), if
continue until uneconomical GORs are reached and the well is the HPAI process in the Buffalo Field were merely a gasflood, it
shut in. would not be recovering as much incremental oil but mostly con-
On the other hand, some wells in the field have exhibited un- nate water. The combustion front has had the ability to mobilize
usual production behaviour, such as horizontal well SBRRU 23- some of the residual oil to immiscible gas injection to allow it to be
26H in Figure 10. This well exhibits an interesting feature: despite produced by the different driving mechanisms associated with the
producing at GORs higher than 20,000 SCF/STB (22 MSCF/STB air injection process.
in SBRRU 23-26H), which are well above the solution GOR of
173 SCF/STB(21), the production profile of the three fluid phases
(oil, gas and water) has remained relatively flat since the start of Fundamental Management Differences
production, and indeed over more than 6 years. This is something
that would never be seen in a conventional gasflood; in fact, that Between HPAI and Gasflooding Projects
flat GOR is very typical of the combustion process. It is a bit un- The previous discussion, and particularly the well cases shown,
fortunate that the reservoir has high initial water saturation [i.e., illustrates that HPAI is not necessarily a gasflood, and ideally (i.e.,
~50%(21)]; had its water content been lower, the high water produc- if time and economics allow) it should be operated as a thermal
tion (water/oil ratio, or WOR, of 4 STB/STB in SBRRU 23-26H) process. Possibly the only case in which HPAI reduces to a simple

Downloaded from http://onepetro.org/JCPT/article-pdf/49/02/56/2145575/spe-133206-pa.pdf by Universidad Industrial De Santander user on 10 May 2022

would have been substituted by higher oil volumes. gasflood and could be modelled as such is when the flue gases
Similar behaviour is observed in many other horizontal pro- become miscible with the oil and a miscible displacement is
ducers, which may suggest that a “frontal drive” type of flood is achieved; in this case, the thermal effects will not play a direct role
sweeping the liquids towards them (“bulldozing” by the combus- as a driving production mechanism due to the high displacement
tion front) and is not allowing the gas phase to dominate the flow efficiency of the flue gases ahead of the thermal front. Neverthe-
path. less, even in this case, the project should be operated as a thermal
But horizontal wells are not the only ones that exhibit interesting project to promote the combustion of the oil so that the oxygen is
production profiles. Figure 11 illustrates the production profile of consumed and carbon dioxide is produced.
vertical well BRRU 34-20, which experienced gas breakthrough in Gasflooding and HPAI are two different processes and must
1983, but since 1989 and despite the increase in gas production, it be treated as such. Managing a HPAI project as a gasflood could
managed to produce at a relatively stable GOR of 25,000 SCF/STB result in reduced oil recovery and performance. Some of the pit-
over approximately 8 years. After that, it exhibits a conventional falls related to operating HPAI as a gasflood are discussed in the
gasflood GOR that increases exponentially with time. following:
Well BRRU 34-8 (Figure 12) exhibits an even more interesting  To achieve a certain pressure during conventional gas injec-
behaviour. Gas broke through in 1983 and its GOR started in- tion, it is preferable to inject at lower rates through several in-
creasing exponentially until 1998, when it reached approximately jectors than to inject at higher rates through fewer injectors;
40,000 SCF/STB, which, despite the high gas production rates, has this is to minimize viscous fingering and delay gas break-
remained relatively stable ever since. through. The combustion process, on the other hand, requires
The previous examples showed wells producing at very high
1,000 30,000
GORs, which may mislead the readers of this paper. Those are
some of the “gas-venting” wells of the field and were chosen be-
Gas Production, MSCFD
Oil Production, BOPD

cause of the “extreme” behaviour exhibited. Figure 13 illustrates

GOR, SCF/STB
the production profile of well SBRRU 32-30, whose GOR stabi- 100 20,000

lizes at a value of approximately 10 MSCF/STB, and is more rep-

resentative of the field GOR (see Figure 14).
Figure 14 shows that despite having wells with high gas and 10 10,000
water production, the field WOR has maintained below 2.8 STB/
STB and the GOR below 21,000 SCF/STB.
Finally, it is important to mention that slim tube tests performed 1 0
using Buffalo oil and flue gases indicate that the flue gas displace-
Jan-88

Jan-90

Jan-92

Jan-94

Jan-96

Jan-98

Jan-00

Jan-02

Jan-04

Jan-06

ment in the Buffalo Field is completely immiscible; a larger CO2

concentration (i.e., greater than 76%) would be required to achieve Date
miscibility with the oil at reservoir conditions(21). Also, slim tube Oil Production Gas Production GOR
tests performed with Buffalo oil at conditions similar to those en-
countered in the field resulted in residual oil saturations of approx- FIGURE 13: Production performance of Well SBRRU 32-30.
imately 47%(7), which is very close to the initial oil saturation in
3,000 30
1,000.0 1,000,000 2,700 27
Oil Production, BOPD
Gas Production, MSCFD

2,400 24
Oil Production, BOPD

GOR, MSCF/STB
WOR, STB/STB

2,100 21
100.0 100,000
GOR (SCF/STB)

1,800 18
1,500 15
10.0 10,000 1,200 12
900 9
1.0 1,000 600 6
300 3
0 0
0.1 100
Jan-54

Jan-58

Jan-62

Jan-66

Jan-70

Jan-74

Jan-78

Jan-82

Jan-86

Jan-90

Jan-94

Jan-98

Jan-02

Jan-06
Jan-80

Jan-82

Jan-84

Jan-86

Jan-88

Jan-90

Jan-92

Jan-94

Jan-96

Jan-98

Jan-00

Jan-02

Jan-04

Jan-06

Date
Date Oil Production Gas-Oil Ratio Water-Oil Ratio
Oil Production Gas Production GOR

FIGURE 14: Production performance of HPAI projects in Buffalo Field

FIGURE 12: Production performance of Well BRRU 34-8. (1954-2006).
February 2010, Volume 49, No. 2 61
 a minimum air flux to maintain the bond-scission reactions;
hence, it is preferable to inject into fewer injectors at higher
rates than to operate a large number of injectors at lower
rates. Operating a HPAI project at lower rates could result in
oxygen addition reactions dominating the process and there-
fore reduced performance.
 In conventional gasflooding, wells performing at high GORs
are usually shut in to avoid recycling of the gas and change
the flooding paths. However, while in conventional gasfloods
the GOR tends to increase exponentially after gas break-
through, combustion GORs tend to flatten out with time, so
shutting the well in may not be the best alternative. As sug-
gested by Moore et al.(22), the best approach may be to shut in
the injector that is believed to service the production well(s)
in question.
 Treating a HPAI project as a gasflood would prevent the
identification of sweet spots containing oil banked by the
thermal front. If one does not recognize the power of the
thermal front, it would be impossible to take advantage of it.
 Having understood the importance of the thermal effects
during a HPAI project as well as the complexity of the pro-
cess, one must recognize that the best way to model and
estimate ultimate recovery from a project of this nature is
through thermal reservoir simulation and not by the use of
isothermal models. However, as pointed out by Gutiérrez et
al.(30), the understanding of combustion processes, and hence
its modelling using reservoir simulators, is an ongoing chal-
lenge where many efforts are currently being made, but is yet
to be completely solved.
Conclusions
1. Based on laboratory and field data, it was shown that HPAI
is more than a simple gasflood, and it should be treated as a
thermal process. The thermal front has the ability to mobilize
some of the residual oil to gas injection; this “extra oil” can
be driven to the production wells either by the flue-gas drive
or the thermal front itself.
2. Production data from the Buffalo fields indicate that wells
exhibit unusual production behaviour and are performing
significantly better than they would under immiscible gas
injection.
3. As opposed to the monotonically increasing GOR that is dis-
tinctive of an immiscible gas injection process, the combus-
tion process that results after air injection exhibits a different
GOR pattern characterized by a decrease in gas production
and/or increase in oil production caused by the arrival of the
oil bank displaced by the combustion front.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge the technical and finan-
cial support from CMG Ltd., CMG Reservoir Simulation Founda-
tion, and NSERC.
A special acknowledgement is made to the members and ex-
members of the In Situ Combustion Research Group at the Uni-
versity of Calgary.
We also thank the management of Continental Resources Inc.,
current operator of the Buffalo Field, for providing the field data
presented in this paper.
Nomenclature
IOIP = initial oil in place
ST = standard
SI Metric Conversion Factors
barrel × 1.58981 E–1 = m3
ft3 × 2.831685 E–2 = m3
62 Journal of Canadian Petroleum Technology
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Authors’ Biographies
Armando R. Montes is currently finishing
a Master of Science degree in chemical and
petroleum engineering. He worked as a Pro-
duction Engineer for the National Oil Com-
pany of Colombia (ECOPETROL S.A.) for
2 years in Orito, Putumayo. He joined the
In Situ Combustion Research Group in the
department of chemical and petroleum en-
gineering at the University of Calgary in
2007, and his interests are in the areas of
February 2010, Volume 49, No. 2 63
reservoir simulation, reservoir characterization and air injection
processes. He holds a B.Sc. degree in petroleum engineering from
the National University of Colombia.
Dubert Gutiérrez is a Reservoir Simula-
tion Engineer with the Computer Modelling
Group (CMG) Ltd. in Calgary. Previously,
he worked for BP Colombia in Bogotá as a
reservoir simulation engineer and for Nexen
Inc. in Calgary as a reservoir engineer. His
current main area of interest is the numer-
ical simulation of enhanced oil recovery
(EOR) processes for the development of
conventional and unconventional oil and
gas reservoirs, with an emphasis on EOR processes that involve
chemical reactions. Dubert holds a B.Sc. degree in petroleum engi-
Downloaded from http://onepetro.org/JCPT/article-pdf/49/02/56/2145575/spe-133206-pa.pdf by Universidad Industrial De Santander user on 10 May 2022
neering from the National University of Colombia at Medellín and
an M.Sc. degree with specialization in reservoir engineering from
the University of Calgary.
R. Gordon Moore is the University Pro-
fessor in Air Injection-Based Oil Recovery at
the University of Calgary since July 2003. He
was Chairman of the Department of Chemical
and Petroleum Engineering at the University
of Calgary from 1992 through 2003. Gordon
was a founding partner in Hycal Energy, and
currently is the President of HOT-TEC En-
ergy Inc. His prime research area has been the
improved recovery of conventional and heavy
oils and bitumens, with particular emphasis on oil recovery by air in-
jection. He is the head of the In Situ Combustion Research Group at
the University of Calgary. He is a distinguished member of the SPE
and served as a SPE Distinguished Lecturer in 2000/2001. Gordon is
also an active member of the Petroleum Society, APEGGA, AIChE,
CSChE and CHOA, and is a registered professional engineer in the
Province of Alberta.
S.A. (Raj) Mehta is a Professor of Oil and Gas
Engineering and the Director of International
Programs in the Department of Chemical
and Petroleum Engineering at the University
vof Calgary. His prime research interests are
in the areas of high pressure combustion in-
cluding mechanisms associated with high
pressure air injection-based oil recovery pro-
cesses, flue gas injection-based IOR and CO2
sequestration, safety aspects of underbalanced
drilling operations, gas phase combustion in
porous media, near wellbore stimulation processes and explosions and
safety aspects associated with the energy industry. He is a member of
a number of Boards, including the Canadian Energy Research Institute
(CERI), the Petroleum Society and the University of Calgary’s Inter-
national Education Council. He is also a member of the Distinguished
Lecturer Selection Committee of the SPE and is a registered profes-
sional engineer in the Province of Alberta.
Matthew Ursenbach is a Research Engineer
for the In Situ Combustion Research Group
in the Department of Chemical and Petro-
leum Engineering at the University of Cal-
gary, where he studies the mechanisms of in
situ combustion and other combustion-related
processes. He holds a Masters of Engineering
degree from the University of Calgary.