Abstract: Hitting geologic
heterogeneities with advanced well
architectures: new challenges for reservoir
simulation
RENARD, G., P. LEMONNIER, C. BENNIS, G. BLANC, Y. DING, D. URGELLI
The recent developments
in drilling technology now provide petroleum engineers with several new
well
architectures for the production of oil and gas fields. These include
horizontal wells and the various
types
of multilateral wells drilled from
a same vertical
well
or from a same horizontal section. Therefore, improvement
of simulation technology in the area of three dimensional reservoir simulation,
especially in the vicinity of wells, becomes a major issue.
This paper addresses the various
challenges issued by new well
architectures when reservoir modeling is
concerned and presents innovative solutions developed by IFP through a
multidisciplinary approach. There are:
- A good characterization of
the distribution of reservoir heterogeneities,
- The automatic generation
of various types
of grids (cartesian, corner-point, triangular, Voronoi,
mixed, . . .) to select the
most adapted one for
the complex geometry of the reservoir
(heterogeneities, pinch outs, faults, . . .),
-The definition of algorithms
capable of determining the best
locations of wells in terms of maximum productivity/injec-
tivity with specified
constraints on wells geometries and on the reservoir
architecture, the generation of grids around advanced
wells and inclusion
of these grids in the reservoir grid,
-Efficient upscaling techniques
of heterogeneities from geological fine scale to simulation large scale,
-The handling of numerical
schemes in unstructured grids,
-A correct numerical treatment
and representation of advanced
wells in the reservoir grid or own grids to accurately
define wellblocks Productivity
Indices,
-Finally, visualization requirements.
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AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90942©1997 AAPG International Conference and Exhibition, Vienna, Austria