Reservoir

Engineering
MSc. Oscar Cahuana Alarcon
 CORE DATA
Generally, the entire interval between the surface casing and total depth is
logged, but far too often taking core is neglected

While the expense of coring and core analysis is not small, it usually is
only a fraction of total well cost (about 5% of the well cost, 1% of well cost
for coring).

Logs provide greater statistical coverage

Core provides key data that logs cannot:

Confirm lithology and mineralogy
Calibrates estimates of fundamental rock properties
Shows how fluids occupy and flow in pore space
Supplies mechanical properties for faster & safer drilling and
better completions

Logs alone cannot characterize a reservoir if knowledge of the

Reservoir Description
Why core analisys
matters?

Recovery factor depends on technical and economic factors

For secondary and tertiary recovery, recovery factor is partly defined by formations
relative permeability characteristics.
Core Analysys
Routine Core Analysis (basic or conventional)
Lower cost and faster turnaround than SCAL
Includes core processing
Basic petrophysics measurements at
ambient conditions
porosity, permeability fluid saturation
Generally standard procedures
Special core Analysis (SCAL)
Expensive and longer
Measurement on saturated samples at reservoir conditions
Electrical properties, capillary pressure, relative permeability
Requires more specialist equipment
Non-standard procedures
Rock Properties
POROSITY

ABSOLUTE
RELATIVE ROUTINE CORE PERMEABILI
PERMEABILITY ANALYSIS TY
RCAL
AND SPECIAL
CORE
ANALYSIS
SCAL

CAPILLARY ROCK
PRESSURE COMPRESSI
BILITY
Fluid Properties
Bo
OIL
FORMATIO
N
VOLUMEN
Pd
FACTOR
DEWP VISCO
OINT SITY
PRESS FLUID
URE PROPERTIES
Pb
BUBBLE

POINT
PRESSU DENSI
RE
TY
Rs C
SOLUTIO FLUID
N COMPRES
GAS/OIL SIBILITY
Fluid Properties

Only one fluid presents in the reservoir: only one set of forces is considered the
attraction between the rock and the fluid

ex . Aquifer porosity and permeability

Fluid 2
Interfacial tension
When more than one fluid Rock Wettability
phase is present, at least Capillary pressure
three sets of active forces Relative permeability
Fluid 1
need to be considered: Fluid 1

Fluid 2
Rock
 The three sets of active forces lead to consider four properties:

Fluid 1 Fluid 1 Fluid 1

Fluid 2 Fluid 2 Fluid 2

Interfacial tension Wettability Capillary pressure Relative permeability

Fluid 1 Fluid 2

Rock Rock
Interfacial Tension
Petroleum reservoir up to three phases, gas, oil and water may coexist. All
these fluids are immiscible at reservoir conditions but they are in contact.

These fluids are separated by a well-defined interface

between
Gas-oil
Gas-water
Oil-water
The particular interface is only a few molecular
diameters in thickness

Multiphase systems: necessary to consider the effect of the forces that exist at the
interface of two immiscible fluids in contact.
Wettability
It is necessary to consider not only the surface forces between a gas and a liquid, and the
interfacial forces between two immiscible liquids but also the forces that are active at the
interface between the liquids and the solids.

It is the combination of all the active forces that determines the wettability of reservoirs
rocks
Tendency for one fluid to adhere to a rock surface in the presence of other immiscible
fluids

It results from the adsorption of molar compounds on the rock surface.

It is a key parameter that affects the petrophysical properties of reservoir rocks:

Distribution of gas, oil, and water within a reservoir rock
Capillary pressure
Relative permeability
Consequently------the production of hydrocarbons and the determination of the
most efficient means of hydrocarbon recovery from petroleum reservoirs.
 Originally the reservoirs are water filled

The water wets the rock

surface
Oil migrates in and the water drains out, but the water still wants to wet the rock, it is
water-wet. Most reservoirs stay this way

Sometimes. Over time, the oil may start to chemically interact with the rock and
displace some of the water off the rock surface, thus becoming oil-wet

The wettability is a measure of how strongly one fluid wets the surface as compared
to the other fluid
AT is a function of the interfacial tension and determines which fluid preferentially wets the
solid

oil

sw
oil sw water

so water so
sw s
w

Contact angle: by convention it is measured through the denser liquid phase and can range from 0 to
180
 A variety of wettability states exist for petroleum reservoirs, primarily
depending on both reservoir fluid and rock characteristics

Strongly water-wet Strongly oil-wet

Water wet and oil wet reservoirs behave differently with respect to a displacement
process.
Waterflood process in a water wet (imbibition process) and oil wet(drainage process) reservoirs
FACTORS AFFECTING WETTABILITY
Oil and formation water compositions. Oils with high content of asphaltenes-oil wetting
conditions.
Rock mineralogy. Carbonates > oil wet (than siliciclastic rocks).
Amount of connate water saturations. < connate water > oil wetting caracter of the
rock. (wettability is also related to the height above the oil water contact)
Capillary Pressure
Capillary phenomena occur in porous media when two or more immiscible fluids are present in
the pore space.
A difference in the pressure across the interface due to interfacial energy between two
immiscible phases results in a curvature of the interface. Capillary pressure is the difference
in pressures.

Capillary forces in a petroleum reservoir are the results of the combined effect of surface and
interfacial
tensions, pore size, geometry, and wetting characteristics of a given system
Drop of oil releases from the seafloor ---immediately rise to the sea surfaceThis rise depends on
the
density difference between the seawater and the oil.
 Oil reservoir

The density difference or the gravity forces are

active but the upward movement of the oil
experiences a resistant force due to capillarity

Formation of petroleum reservoirs

Migration of hydrocarbons from a source rock to the water-saturated reservoir

rock
Retention of fluids in pore spaces against gravity forces. Complete gravity segregation into distinct layers
of
gas, oil and water did not take place due to capillary forces
Equilibrium occurs when capillary forces and gravitational forces balanced and resulted in a
particular
fluid distribution, zonation, and fluid contacts in reservoir
Connate water or irreducible water saturation is found at
higher
elevations above the oil-water contact
 Reservoir production

Capillary forces aid or oppose the process of displacement of one fluid by another in the pore
space

Water floodingCapillary forces may act together with frictional forces to resist the flow of
oil.
As a consequence, to maintain a porous medium partially saturated with non-wetting fluid
while
the medium is also exposed to the wetting fluid, it is necessary to maintain the pressure of
the non-wetting fluid at a value greater than that in the wetting fluid
Important to understand the nature of these capillary
forces

From reservoir structure As well as the actual hydrocarbon recovery point of view

26
 OWC
Oil water contact FWL
Free water level
 OWC
FWL

Oil water contact

Free water level
 OWC
FWL

Oil water contact

Free water level
Relative Permeability
In order to accurately describe the simultaneous multiphase fluid-flow characteristics
in
petroleum reservoirs, it becomes necessary to introduce and define the concept of
relative permeability.
The multiphase fluid systems play a very important role in the reservoir flow processes
when
petroleum reservoirs are produced by primary recovery mechanism or immiscible
displacement
methods involving
It is under the injection of gas
these circumstances that or water
more than one fluid phase is flowing or is mobile through
a
porous medium; thus the flow of one fluid phase interferes with the other.
This interference is a competition for the flows paths and must be described for
accurately
hydrocarbon recovery from petroleum reservoirs

The determination of relative permeability allows comparison of the different abilities

of fluids to flow in the presence of each other, since the presence of more than one
fluid generally inhibits flow
 Permeability at 100% saturation of single fluid
ABSOLUTE PERMEABILITY
e. g. brine permeability, gas permeability

Permeability to one phase when 2 or more phases present

EFFECTIVE PERMEABILITY
e. g Ko (eff) at Swi

Ratio of effective permeability to a base (often absolute)

RELATIVE PERMEABILITY permeability
e. g. Ko/Ka or Ko/Ko at Swi
 Relative permeability curves are known as rel perm

Endpoints are the (4) points at the ends of the

curves
The displacing phase is always first, i.e.:

Kw-Ko is water(w) displacing oil(o)

Kg-Ko is gas(g) displacing oil(o)
Kg-Kw is gas displacing water

Relative permeability (e.g. oil&water) versus water

saturation

Saturation values:
Swi
Sor
Swi Sor
 LABORATORY MEASUREMENTS
Laboratory measurements are made by displacing one phase with another (unsteady state test-
USS), or simultaneous flow of two phases (steady state tests-SS). The effective permeabilities thus
measured over a range of fluid saturations and relative permeability curves are constructed.

Example, USS-waterflood experiment- Water/oil Kr

curves
At the beginning of the experiment, the core is saturated with
80% oil, and there is an irreducible water saturation of 20%
due to the water wet nature of this particular example

A: Permeability of oil under these conditions. Kro=1 because

this measurement has been taken as the base permeability.

B: the beginning of water permeability. Krw=0

because
irreducible water is, by definition immobile.

56
 LABORATORY MEASUREMENTS
Example, USS-waterflood experiment-
Water/oil Kr curves
80%-oil
20%-water
A: Permeability of oil under these conditions. Kro=1 because this
measurement has been taken as the base permeability.

B: the beginning of water permeability. Krw=0 because

irreducible
water is, by definition immobile.
water

Water is then injected into the core at one end at a constant rate.
The
volume of the emerging fluids (oil and water) are measured at
the other end of the core, and the differential pressure across the core
is also measured. During this process the permeability to oil reduces
to zero along the curve ACD, and the permeability to water increases
along the curve BCE.
There is no further production of oil from the sample after Kro = 0 at
point D, and so point D occurrs at the residual oil saturation, Sor.
Kro + Krw 1 , always
Competing Forces
GRAVITY FORCES
Minimised in lab tests
Water injected from bottom to
top
VISCOUS FORCES
Darcys Law

CAPILLARY FORCES
Flood rates
Wettability
 Relative permeability versus wettability

Water-wet systems
Type of systems Oi-wet systems
Intermediate wettability
case

Many reservoirs systems fall between the two extremes. Better to understand the extremes
in order to minimize the misinterpretation of laboratory tests.

CAPILLARY FORCES

In water-wet systems, capillary forces assist water to enter

pores.
In oil-wet systems, they trend to prevent water entering pores.
 WATER-WET SYSTEMS
Considering a water-wet pore system at Swi (generally 15 to
30%) some distance from well bore such that flow rates are
low, typically advancing at 1ft/day. This is equivalent to
about 4 cc/hr in a typical laboratory waterflood. The
following sequence occurs as water migrates into the rock:
Microsaturation and Water Flood Relperm curve for a water-wet system

Initially at Swi, water is the Water migrates in a piston

wetting phase and will not like fashion, tending to
flow. Kro = 1 and Krw = 0 displace most of the oil
ahead of it

at Swi during flood

 WATER-WET SYSTEMS

Microsaturation and Water Flood Relperm curve for a water-wet

system

As water saturation
increases, oil flow tends
to cease abruptly, and
Sor is reached provide most of the

at Sor High rate bump

 OIL-WET SYSTEMS
Considering water entering an oil-wet pore system
containing (tipically) very low water saturations.
The sequence of events from Swi is illustrated:
Microsaturation and Water Flood Relperm curve for a oil-wet
system

Capillary pressure
considerations indicate that
an applied pressure
differential will be requiered
before water will enter the
largest pore. The actual Water flows through the
pressure differential required largest flow channels first,
is dictated by the equation: Kro falls and Krw rises rapidly

at Swi At water breakthrough

 CRAIGS RULES

SUMMARY- CRAIGS RULES WATER-WET ROCK OIL-WET ROCK

>0,20 <0,15
Swc

Sw at which Krw= Kro >0,50 <0,50

Krw at Sw = 1-Sor <0,30 >0,50

Capillary pressure and relative permeability

OWC
FWL