Evaluation of Crossflow Effects in Multilateral Wells
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abstract
As drilling and completion technology has advanced dramatically, developing new oil fields faces new opportunities of well structure selection, especially for the fields that are sensitive to issues such as environmental conservation, cost effectiveness, safety control, and well management. Horizontal, multi-branching and multilateral technologies have been used in many field applications all over the world to enhance the reservoir recovery in a cost-effective way. When the well structures become complex, producing from these "fancy wells" could become difficult, and sometimes, detrimental to overall recovery. To study the strategies for optimizing multilateral wells, we have developed a mathematical model to predict well performance for horizontal and multilateral wells using coupled multiphase models of wellbore/reservoir flow. The flow distribution along the laterals is predicted as a function of tubing head pressure (deliverability of the well), and overall well performance as a function of time is predicted by a simple material balance relationship. A common problem for such wells is that commingled production from multilateral branches can often lead to crossflow from one reservoir compartment to another. The likelihood of crossflow depends on initial reservoir conditions, but also very much on the operating conditions of the well. Deleterious interactions between commingled reservoirs accessed by multilateral wells must be reliably preventable for these types of completions to have broad application. Some case studies and hypothetical examples are presented in the paper to show the procedures for optimizing the well structure and well performance. Production strategies that would help to eliminate crossflow are discussed.
