Faster, lower-cost measures of multiphase permeability of conventional reservoirs are promised by a digital rock analysis method developed by BP and Exa, which is marketing software to measure relative permeability. This paper describes the development of “digital-rocks” technology, in which high-resolution 3D image data are used in conjunction with advanced modeling and simulation methods to measure petrophysical rock properties.

The complete paper presents a new three-phase relative permeability model for use in chemical-flooding simulators. Faster, lower-cost measures of multiphase permeability of conventional reservoirs are promised by a digital rock analysis method developed by BP and Exa, which is marketing software to measure relative permeability. In this study, the authors use measured CO2/brine relative permeability data available in the literature to study the behavior of the data obtained for various rocks.

Researchers at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland, are building replica core samples using 3D printers and installing sensors inside them as they go. Their goal is to directly monitor pore-scale flow behavior from the inside of these so-called “smart rocks.” Researchers at the University of Texas at Austin (UT) have set an audacious goal to halve the time, cost, and number of rig personnel required for drilling every type of well, from unconventional shale to ultradeepwater. Researchers at Rice University in Houston are hoping their new theory on composite properties may help the oil and gas industry reduce the time it takes to develop and test new materials. In the realm of enabling technologies, multiphase flow modeling has proven to be one of the most important to the oil and gas industry.

Operators continue to look to prolific high-permeability, clastic reservoirs in basins around the world. The use of high-deviation and horizontal well trajectories in these fields improves productivity but increases the challenges of sand control. Although early inflow control devices and intelligent completions (ICs) were introduced almost 20 years ago, completion technology has not kept pace with advancements in drilling technology.

An AI-based application enabled operators to preempt ESP failures while optimizing production. Using the supplied data set of cone penetration test results, competing teams had to predict the number of hammer blows required to drive the pile a given unit of depth in the North Sea. Data-driven methods offer significant advantages in the industry, under certain conditions, over conventional methods. But reservations still exist about their use. The paper serves to bridge the gap between unclear understanding of these methods and their successful acceptance and implementation.

The complete paper describes an advanced Rankine cycle process-based system that converts waste heat into usable electrical power to improve the efficiency of gas-compression stations on gas-production platforms and pipelines. More gas is flowing from Egyptian waters and the Eastern Mediterranean with BP’s launch of its Atoll Phase One project. Production of low-viscosity liquids, including condensates, from tight reservoirs such as shales is severely restricted by the ultralow permeability of such formations, limiting production to a very small fraction, usually less than 5%, of the liquids in place.

This paper presents a new approach for more-accurate modeling of liquid blockage in tight oil and gas reservoirs and investigates the use of solvents for blockage removal. This paper provides a more straightforward method for estimating stress-dependent permeability and capillary pressure in rock fractures.

The author writes that the generally accepted Knudsen diffusion in shales is based on a mistranslation of the flow physics and may give theoretically unsound predictions of the increased permeability of shales to gas flow. An extensive laboratory study was carried out with two objectives: to evaluate the effect of water quality on injectivity of disposal wells with reservoir core plugs and to restore injectivity of damaged wells. The F field in the Middle East currently has more than 40 producing wells in the center of the structure. The uneven well distribution limits the understanding of 3D reservoir characterization, particularly in the flank areas.

Aqueous foam has been demonstrated to have promise in conformance-control applications. This paper explores the foaming behavior of a CO2-soluble, cationic, amine-based surfactant. The authors present the results of a detailed experimental study in which underlying pore-level-displacement physics of two- and three-phase flow in a fractured rock sample is investigated with high-resolution X-ray microtomography techniques.

May be localized in areas of high vertical permeability.