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Assisted History Matching Using Pattern Recognition Technology, Alireza Shahkarami Aug 2014

Assisted History Matching Using Pattern Recognition Technology, Alireza Shahkarami

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Reservoir simulation and modeling is utilized throughout field development in different capacities. Sensitivity analysis, history matching, operations optimization and uncertainty assessment are the conventional analyses in full field model studies. Realistic modeling of the complexities of a reservoir requires a large number of grid blocks. As the complexity of a reservoir increases and consequently the number of grid blocks, so does the time required to accomplish the abovementioned tasks.;This study aims to examine the application of pattern recognition technologies to improve the time and efforts required for completing successful history matching projects. The pattern recognition capabilities of Artificial Intelligence and …


Analysis Of Production Data From Horizontal Shale Wells Using Decline Curves, Atoosa Mashayekhi Aug 2014

Analysis Of Production Data From Horizontal Shale Wells Using Decline Curves, Atoosa Mashayekhi

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Recent interest in the exploitation of Marcellus shale play, using horizontal drilling and multistage hydraulic fracturing, has increased the demand for reliable estimation of recoverable reserves from ultra-low permeability shale gas formations. Due to the limited field experience, the production performances of Marcellus shale gas reservoirs as well as the key parameters that affect the long-term production of the horizontal wells have not been well-established.;Among all the prediction methods, only the Decline Curve Analysis (DCA) technique has proved successful in forecasting production data rapidly and to a high degree of accuracy. Several DCA models including conventional Arps, PLE, and Duong …


Fully Coupled Finite Element Model To Study Multiple Hydraulic Fracturing In Heterogeneous Tight Formations, Ruizhi Zhong Aug 2014

Fully Coupled Finite Element Model To Study Multiple Hydraulic Fracturing In Heterogeneous Tight Formations, Ruizhi Zhong

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Hydraulic fracturing is a widely used technique in industry to enhance oil and gas recovery. The process involves the injection of fracking fluid with high pressure into the wellbore to propagate initial fractures generated during well perforation. It is a coupled process of fluid and rock mechanics one controlling the fluid movement and other fracture propagation. There is a lack of reliable and robust simulation technique that can couple these two processes at the same time being practical for large domain size of hydraulic fracturing in the field scale. In hydraulic fracturing, multiple fractures are also created within one cluster …


Surrogate Reservoir Model For Generating Pressure, Saturation And Compositional Characteristics At The Grid-Block Level; Sacroc Field, Scurry County, Texas, David Moreno Aug 2014

Surrogate Reservoir Model For Generating Pressure, Saturation And Compositional Characteristics At The Grid-Block Level; Sacroc Field, Scurry County, Texas, David Moreno

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Nowadays, due to advancements in data acquisition technologies in oil and gas industry more data are available for generating reservoir simulation models. This leads to high fidelity reservoir simulation models which are highly complex and computationally expensive. The conventional reservoir management studies require hundreds realizations of the simulation models. As S. Gencer (2007) described, the reservoir simulation trend is towards "more: more users, more models, more cells, more wells, more cases, more data and more integration" [1]. In order to enhance the reservoir model descriptions, more computational power would have to be designed and engineered to keep up with our …


Coupled 3-D Numerical Simulation Of Proppant Transport And Fluid Flow In Hydraulic Fracturing, Bing Kong May 2014

Coupled 3-D Numerical Simulation Of Proppant Transport And Fluid Flow In Hydraulic Fracturing, Bing Kong

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Hydraulic fracturing is one of the most common and important stimulation techniques used in oil and gas industry to create high conductivity flow paths for hydrocarbons to flow from the reservoir matrix to the wellbore. Hydraulic fracturing is a complex process including different physical and chemical phenomena. It involves rock mechanics for the part of fracture propagation and involves fluid mechanics for the part of slurry injection, fluid flow, fluid leak-off, proppant transport, proppant settling and interaction between fluid and proppant particles. In this study, the focus is on fluid and proppant motion within hydraulic fractures. The effectiveness of hydraulic …


Poroelastic Effect On Gas Transport And Storage In Organic Rich Shale Reservoir, Bahiya Jabbar May 2014

Poroelastic Effect On Gas Transport And Storage In Organic Rich Shale Reservoir, Bahiya Jabbar

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

This study sheds the light on the effect of poroelastic properties of the shale matrix on storage and transportation mechanism in multi-scale organic rich shale gas reservoirs. Over last decades shale gas research widen significantly, however, the behavior and properties of shale formation still need more investigation. Most of our knowledge regarding poroelsctic behavior of shale matrix comes from studies on coalbed methane reservoirs, which is somewhat similar to shale gas reservoirs. The poroelastic effect of coal and shale is a strong function of total organic content (TOC) of these sedimentary rocks. Coalbed methane reservoirs have more than 50% TOC, …


Simulation Of Multi-Component Gas Flow And Condensation In Marcellus Shale Reservoir, Abdallah Elamin Dec 2013

Simulation Of Multi-Component Gas Flow And Condensation In Marcellus Shale Reservoir, Abdallah Elamin

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

The Marcellus shale formation, with more than 463 trillion cubic feet (Tcf) of recoverable gas in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, will play a critical role in providing clean energy, environmental sustainability, and increased security for our nation. However, due to recent low gas prices, most of the operating companies have slowed down their activities in dry gas areas and refocused their attention in oil and condensate production from liquid-rich regions. This change in production plans requires detailed investigation of gas condensate bank developments and saturation dynamics in shale gas reservoirs that change greatly with reservoir conditions. An advanced level of …


Wellbore Stability In Ultra-Deep Formations Of The Gulf Of Mexico, Gbenga Kayode Aug 2013

Wellbore Stability In Ultra-Deep Formations Of The Gulf Of Mexico, Gbenga Kayode

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

This thesis work looks into Horizontal wellbore integrity or stability in the Mars Ursa Basin of the Gulf of Mexico using different geo-mechanical properties of this highly producing formation in analyzing stress build up both around the producing wells as well as the producing formations. Different cases were analyzed using the CMG simulator where consideration was given to cases of single as well as multiple producing horizontal wells. The model built considered both the basic reservoir model as well as geo-mechanical models. The individual cases considered included different geomechanical properties of the producing formation these properties however include frictional angle, …


A Strategic Study And Economics Of Optimum Well Design For The Utica Shale, Linda N. Anumele Aug 2013

A Strategic Study And Economics Of Optimum Well Design For The Utica Shale, Linda N. Anumele

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

This research seeks to venture into optimal well and fracture design via reservoir modeling, simulation and economic analysis in an attempt to discover, analyze, interpret and present the best ways of maximizing hydrocarbon (natural gas) production from the Utica shale which is a relatively new reservoir. Furthermore, comparison of natural gas production in deep and thick Utica shale formation sections is studied for various well and facture designs in conjunction with stimulated reservoir volume analysis and economic analysis in order to achieve an optimal design. The objective of this study is to compare and contrast the gas production from various …


Analysis Of Shale Production Performance Using Decline Curve Methods, Brad Thomas Nelson Aug 2013

Analysis Of Shale Production Performance Using Decline Curve Methods, Brad Thomas Nelson

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

With the recent development of shale gas reservoirs such as the Marcellus using horizontal drilling and fracturing, it has become necessary to evaluate the amount of gas recoverable for both economic and operational purposes. As a result of limited production history, the production behavior of horizontal well producing from Marcellus shale has not been well established. A technique in accomplishing the estimation of future production history would be most useful to the industry.;Decline curve analysis (DCA) methods have been utilized successfully in various hydrocarbon plays throughout the world in approximating future production. Several DCA models have been proposed specifically for …


Production History Matching And Forecasting Of Shale Assets Using Pattern Recognition, Soodabeh Esmaili Aug 2013

Production History Matching And Forecasting Of Shale Assets Using Pattern Recognition, Soodabeh Esmaili

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Generating long-term development plans and reservoir management of shale assets has continued apace. In this study, a novel method that integrates traditional reservoir engineering with pattern recognition capabilities of artificial intelligence and data mining is applied in order to accurately and efficiently model fluid flow in shale reservoirs. The methodology is efficient due to its relatively short development time and is accurate as a result of high quality history matches it achieves for individual wells in a multiwell asset. The technique that is named Artificial Intelligence (AI) Based Reservoir Modeling is a formalized and comprehensive, full-field empirical reservoir model. It …


Impact Of Geo-Mechanical Properties On The Fracture Treatment Of Utica Shale, Tarig M. Osman Aug 2013

Impact Of Geo-Mechanical Properties On The Fracture Treatment Of Utica Shale, Tarig M. Osman

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Unconventional gas reservoirs become one of the most important energy sources in United States and all over the world. The Appalachian basin has very organic rich shale formations; it contains Marcellus and Utica shale formations with billions of cubic feet of natural gas as reserve. The development in hydraulic fracturing technology with horizontal drilling for thousands of lateral feet increase the recoverable gas from the shale formations and challenges the researchers to understand the fracturing mechanism and to study the relation between operation parameters and formation properties with the fracturing treatment outcome.;The main objective of this thesis was to study …


Comprehensive Analysis Of An Ongoing Co2 Storage Project, Daniel Moreno May 2013

Comprehensive Analysis Of An Ongoing Co2 Storage Project, Daniel Moreno

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Increase in CO2 emission has become an important issue over the years due to its environmental impacts as a greenhouse gas. The fact that these emissions are primarily derived from energy consumption and that 85% of the primary power is supplied by fossil fuels (Orr, 2004), makes the reduction of CO2 emissions a major challenge. CO2 sequestration in the geological formations has been identified as an alternative to counter the impact of the emissions. CO2 sequestration refers to the capture and long term storage of CO2.;In order to properly asses the viability of CO2 sequestration in a geological formation as …


Synthetic Geomechanical Logs And Distributions For Marcellus Shale, Mohammad Omidvar Eshkalak May 2013

Synthetic Geomechanical Logs And Distributions For Marcellus Shale, Mohammad Omidvar Eshkalak

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

The intent of this study is to generate synthetic Geomechanical Logs for a specific Marcellus Shale asset using Artificial Intelligence and Data mining Technology. Geomechanical Distributions (Map and Volume) for the entire Marcellus Shale asset was completed. In order to accomplish the objectives, conventional well logs such as Gamma Ray and Bulk Density are used to build Data-Driven models. The Data-Driven technique used in this study is applicable to other shale reservoirs.;Successful recovery of hydrocarbons from the reservoirs, notably shale, is attributed to realizing the key fundamentals of reservoir rock properties. Having adequate and sufficient information regarding the variable lithology …


Analysis Of Production Data From Marcellus Shale Horizontal Wells In Wv, Mohamed N. El Sgher Jan 2013

Analysis Of Production Data From Marcellus Shale Horizontal Wells In Wv, Mohamed N. El Sgher

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

In recent years, the interest in unconventional reservoirs has increased all over the world. The unconventional gas reservoir is a term commonly used to refer to a low permeability reservoir that produces mainly dry natural gas and is not able to produce an economic flow rate without stimulation treatments. The best way to improve the production is by a horizontal well with multiple hydraulic fractures. Hydraulic fracturing is a stimulation practice to improve the permeability in order to obtain commercial production. Horizontal wells with multiple hydraulic fracture treatments have proven to be an effective method for development of unconventional reservoirs.;The …


The Flow Regimes Associated With Hydraulic Fractured Horizontal Wells In Shale Formations, Saba J. Raeisi Jan 2013

The Flow Regimes Associated With Hydraulic Fractured Horizontal Wells In Shale Formations, Saba J. Raeisi

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Shale gas in the United States went from a practically invisible resource to massive reserves that challenge the largest conventional gas accumulations in the world. Shale gas success is directly the result of economically managed deployment of petroleum technology, namely horizontal wells .Horizontal drilling and multi-stage stimulation technologies are driving the successful development of shale plays.;The production performance of hydraulically fractured horizontal wells in naturally fractured ultra-low permeability shale formations is not well established since the interaction among the hydraulic fractures, natural fracture system, and the shale matrix leads to a complex production mechanism that has not been fully investigated. …


The Application Of Single Porosity Model To Predict The Performance Of The Low Permeability Naturally Fractured Formations, Martial Hermann Tchuindjang Yatchou Dec 2012

The Application Of Single Porosity Model To Predict The Performance Of The Low Permeability Naturally Fractured Formations, Martial Hermann Tchuindjang Yatchou

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Natural gas extraction from shale is currently an expensive endeavor due to the tight reservoir rock with nano-darcy permeability. New technology in the form of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing (fracturing through the use of high pressure liquids) has overcome the flow capacity problem of shale to achieve economic production. The low permeability shale formations, such Marcellus Shale, contain a natural fracture system with extremely low permeability. The characteristics of the natural fracture system are non-existent; therefore the application of single porosity model to predict the production performance of the shale formations can reduce the need for detail fracture system …


Impact Of Stress-Field Changes Induced By Hydraulic Fracturing On Subsurface Fault Stability, Qian Gao Dec 2012

Impact Of Stress-Field Changes Induced By Hydraulic Fracturing On Subsurface Fault Stability, Qian Gao

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Hydraulic fracturing is essential for economically producing hydrocarbons from shale reservoirs, and thus has been extensively used in completion of shale gas wells. However, fracturing formations can change in-situ stresses in the surrounding areas. There are concerns that hydraulic fracturing may potentially reactivate the subsurface faults nearby the treatment wells. The reactivated faults could cause many problems, such as early aborting/failure of fracturing treatment, fluid leakage along the fault and even seismicity events.;3D numerical models are developed based on finite element method. The comparison between analytical and numerical solutions indicates an excellent agreement has been achieved, which certificates the applicability …


Artificial Intelligence Assisted History Matching -- Proof Of Concept, Alireza Shahkarami Aug 2012

Artificial Intelligence Assisted History Matching -- Proof Of Concept, Alireza Shahkarami

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

History matching is the process of adjusting uncertain reservoir parameters until an acceptable match with the measured production data is obtained. Complexity and sub-optimal knowledge of reservoir characteristics makes this process time-consuming with high computational cost. In the past, computer-assisted history matching has attempted to make this process faster; however, the degree of success of these techniques continues to be a subject for debate.;In this study, the objective is to prove and examine the application of a relatively new Artificial Intelligence based technology (Surrogate Reservoir Model -- SRM) to assist the history match process. SRM is a prototype of full-field …


A Study Of Chemical Interactions Between The Marcellus Shale And Attapulgite And Bentonite Clays, Virginia Price Naryka May 2012

A Study Of Chemical Interactions Between The Marcellus Shale And Attapulgite And Bentonite Clays, Virginia Price Naryka

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Chemical interactions occur between water based muds and shale formations. These shale-fluid interactions are often associated with problems that arise when drilling. This paper presents results from a study investigating chemical interactions that occurred between the Marcellus shale and attapulgite and bentonite clays. The aim of this project was to determine if there were particular elemental changes that could be directly associated with either an attapulgite or bentonite clay. In this study, samples from two wells in West Virginia were analyzed. A Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) was used to observe the surface of each sample, and an INCA X-Ray Microanalysis …


Impact Of Relative Permeability On The Outcomes Of Natural Gas Production From Low Permeability Reservoir, Melaine Edouard Kolimedje May 2012

Impact Of Relative Permeability On The Outcomes Of Natural Gas Production From Low Permeability Reservoir, Melaine Edouard Kolimedje

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Tight Gas Reservoir (TGR) is one of the primary types of unconventional reservoirs now accounting for about 25% of US gas production. The complexity of the reservoir leads to low productivity issues and thus there is a need to thoroughly understand all the parameters of uncertainty. One of the prime factors affecting productivity is the relative permeability. In this study, the effect of relative permeability on cumulative gas production for gas-water phase was studied in detail using a numerical computer simulation study.;In an effort to comprehend the impact of the relative permeability on gas production over the life of these …


The Incorporation Of Aluminum Hydroxide In Water Based Muds To Stabilize Marcellus Shale Drilling In West Virginia, Hussain Ali Al-Fadhel May 2012

The Incorporation Of Aluminum Hydroxide In Water Based Muds To Stabilize Marcellus Shale Drilling In West Virginia, Hussain Ali Al-Fadhel

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

The purpose of this study was to develop a safe and environmentally acceptable water base mud that will be able to suppress swelling and promote stability to the West Virginian Marcellus shale. The problem was approached by utilizing aluminum precipitation chemistry in the drilling fluid, unlike the traditional cation-exchange approach.;A dynamic swelling meter was designed by modifying a 0.001 mm resolution dial indicator and using a specially programmed smart cable connecting the dial indicator to a computer. The swelling data was acquired by the smart cable every six seconds. As a result, there were 14,400 measured points for each sample …


Impact Of Stimulation Treatments On Production Performance Of Horizontal Wells In The Marcellus Shale, Kimberly L. Larch May 2012

Impact Of Stimulation Treatments On Production Performance Of Horizontal Wells In The Marcellus Shale, Kimberly L. Larch

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

The interest in exploitation of ultra-low permeability formations, such as the Marcellus Shale, has increased in the recent years. Shale formations require massive stimulation treatments to achieve economic production. The recent advances in horizontal drilling and multistage hydraulic fracturing have proved successful in achieving commercial production. However, the parameters that directly affect lifetime production of the wells have not been well established.;The primary objective of this study is to examine the effects of basic stimulation parameters used in hydraulic fracturing of Marcellus Shale wells on production performance. Historical production data and stimulation treatment information have been collected and analyzed for …


Effect Of Sediment Composition On The Uniformity Of Experimentally-Formed Methane Hydrate, Terrence R. Ryan May 2012

Effect Of Sediment Composition On The Uniformity Of Experimentally-Formed Methane Hydrate, Terrence R. Ryan

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Experimentalists that try to duplicate the methane hydrate found in natural systems have regularly made non-uniform hydrate in packed sediments. Some element of the natural system is missing from the experimental procedure. The goal of this research was to discover what role sediment composition and grain size play in the uniformity of experimentally-formed methane hydrate. The discoveries were quite surprising.;The motivation for this research lies in the analysis of sediment samples and well-log data from the 2010 Mount Elbert, AK Stratigraphic Test Well. Sedimentological analysis of core samples from this well indicated that a thin section within the methane hydrate …


Production Decline Behavior Of Shale Gas Reservoirs, Zahra Razzaghpanah Jan 2012

Production Decline Behavior Of Shale Gas Reservoirs, Zahra Razzaghpanah

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

The rise in global demand for energy leads oil and gas industry to enhance and develop newer techniques and technologies that produce more oil and gas from resources. Unconventional gas resources comprise a very important share of the domestic natural gas resource base and offer tremendous potential for future reserve and production growth. One of the most important issues associated with shale gas reservoirs is to have an accurate and reliable estimation of the reserves and ultimate recovery. The purpose of this research is to compare different decline curve analysis techniques, it is also to provide a more reliable method …


A Parametric Study And Economic Evaluation Of Drilling Patterns In Deep, Thick Cbm Reservoirs, Ali Omran Ali Nasar Dec 2011

A Parametric Study And Economic Evaluation Of Drilling Patterns In Deep, Thick Cbm Reservoirs, Ali Omran Ali Nasar

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Over the past decade, the production from unconventional reservoirs such as coalbed methane has increased dramatically. The focal driving force for this growth in coalbed methane production was the development and promulgation of reservoir engineering and completion technology.;There have been many studies performed on the well configuration and production optimization techniques in the coal seams. According to many of these studies horizontal, deviated and multi-lateral wells are of more benefits compared to the vertical wells. However, the targets of these studies have mostly been the thin coal seams while this result might not hold for the thick CBM reservoirs. The …


Experimental Analysis Of The Post-Failure Behavior Of Coal And Rock Under Laboratory Compression Tests, Dachao Neil Nie Dec 2011

Experimental Analysis Of The Post-Failure Behavior Of Coal And Rock Under Laboratory Compression Tests, Dachao Neil Nie

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

A major aspect of coal mine design is the structural stability of the mine. For establishing structural stability, the strength of the strata is determined by recovering the cores. The strength is determined through various methods and one method in particular is the Uniaxial Compressive Strength of the rock, which is commonly adopted as the standard strength indicator. However, in-situ behavior by past researchers have shown that rock and coal show significant residual strength contrary to the failure path observed in a conventional compression tests. Researchers in past had used stiff system for generating the post failure behavior of the …


Alternative Modeling Of Multiply Hydraulic Fractures In Horizontal Wells Completed In Low Permeability Formation, Mahmod S. Alkalawi Dec 2011

Alternative Modeling Of Multiply Hydraulic Fractures In Horizontal Wells Completed In Low Permeability Formation, Mahmod S. Alkalawi

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

Many conventional gas reservoirs around the world have been developed and well-understood on contrary to unconventional gas reservoirs where the amount of information available to the public considered still not abundant. The unconventional reservoirs (tight formation) where permeability ranges from 0.001millidarciesto micro-Darcy permeability is a relatively new area in some parts of the world and the details involving ways to increase productivity of wells and best fracture design yet has to be investigated .The unconventional gas reservoirs are important in the world due to its availability, future energy demand around the world, and most conventional gas reservoirs have already been …


Modeling Studies To Evaluate Performance Of The Horizontal Wells Completed In Shale, Abbas Belyadi Dec 2011

Modeling Studies To Evaluate Performance Of The Horizontal Wells Completed In Shale, Abbas Belyadi

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

The results of the modeling studies to determine the production performance of multiple fractured horizontal wells completed in shale formation has been summarized in this dissertation. A commercial reservoir simulator was utilized to model both single and dual porosity reservoir (with and without adsorption) with multiple layers. The impact of reservoir characteristics including natural fractures and hydraulic fractures properties on the production performance were investigated. In addition, the results were utilized to investigate the flow regimes for horizontal wells with one or multiple hydraulic fractures.;Flow regime identification in low permeability reservoirs is extremely critical to evaluate performance of the horizontal …


Impact Of Hydraulic Fractures On Type Curves For Horizontal Wells In Cbm Reservoirs, David Christopher Bell Aug 2011

Impact Of Hydraulic Fractures On Type Curves For Horizontal Wells In Cbm Reservoirs, David Christopher Bell

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

As production technologies continue to increase, more and more unconventional natural gas plays are becoming economical and attractive to produce. CBM, or coalbed methane, currently accounts for approximately ten percent of all natural gas production in the U.S., and that number is increasing. Therefore, it is critical to understand what makes a reservoir a viable option for production development.;Many current tools used to predict the performance of a reservoir rely heavily on unknowns about the formation, and are therefore risky and complex. Numerical methods and computer simulations can greatly aid in the evaluation, but still remain an incomplete description of …