Co-Injection of Non-Condensable Gas and Foam in SAGD using a Modified Well Configuration - A Simulation Study

Zhang, Yushuo

Co-Injection of Non-Condensable Gas and Foam in SAGD using a Modified Well Configuration - A Simulation Study

dc.contributor.advisor	Maini, B. B.
dc.contributor.author	Zhang, Yushuo
dc.contributor.committeemember	Sumon, Kazi Z.
dc.contributor.committeemember	Dong, Mingzhe
dc.contributor.committeemember	Sarma, Helmanta Kumar
dc.date	2018-11
dc.date.accessioned	2018-09-10T14:58:48Z
dc.date.available	2018-09-10T14:58:48Z
dc.date.issued	2018-08-29
dc.description.abstract	The objective of this research is to examine the feasibility of foam co-injection with steam in SAGD using modified well configurations using numerical simulation. The foam used in this project is a composition of water, non-condensable gas (NCG) and surfactant. The application of foam in this study is for achieving the gas mobility reduction and decreasing the residual oil saturation. The use of foam forms a more stable insulating layer below the top of formation, which results in lowered overburden heat loss and cSOR. To place the foam directly below the overburden rock, vertical steam injectors are implemented in this study. Simulation runs are created using CMG STARS (Thermal and Advanced Process Simulator) using Long Lake Pad 16 as the target location. These simulation results demonstrated substantial improvement in cSOR by co-injecting foam with steam using the vertical injectors. Non-flowing boundary condition was used in all simulations. The producer operational constraint is a combination of maximum live steam rate and minimum bottom hole pressure (BHP). The base case forecasts production from January 2017 to January 2027 in steam only SAGD operation. The base case showed approximately 75,000 m3 oil production in 10 years, with a cumulative Steam Oil Ratio (cSOR) of 6.19. The simulation results show that injecting the foam improved both cumulative oil production and cSOR. As expected, foam reduces the gas mobility and stabilizes the insulating blanket formed by high gas saturation at the top of the steam chamber. Injection of foam also increases the trapped gas saturation and reduces the residual oil saturation. The optimized simulation case with three vertical wells enabled the cSOR to be as low as 4.3 at 3,500 kPa operation pressure. However, the maximum allowed operating pressure at Long Lake is 2,600 kPa. The optimized case under lowered pressure of 2,500 kPa uses four injection-wells configuration, which gave cSOR of 4.25.	en_US
dc.identifier.citation	Zhang, Y. (2018). Co-Injection of Non-Condensable Gas and Foam in SAGD using a Modified Well Configuration - A Simulation Study (Master's thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca. doi:10.11575/PRISM/32894	en_US
dc.identifier.doi	http://dx.doi.org/10.11575/PRISM/32894
dc.identifier.uri	http://hdl.handle.net/1880/107718
dc.language.iso	eng
dc.publisher.faculty	Graduate Studies
dc.publisher.faculty	Schulich School of Engineering
dc.publisher.institution	University of Calgary	en
dc.publisher.place	Calgary	en
dc.rights	University of Calgary graduate students retain copyright ownership and moral rights for their thesis. You may use this material in any way that is permitted by the Copyright Act or through licensing that has been assigned to the document. For uses that are not allowable under copyright legislation or licensing, you are required to seek permission.
dc.subject	Foam
dc.subject	SAGD
dc.subject	NCG
dc.subject	Thermal Recovery
dc.subject.classification	Engineering--Chemical	en_US
dc.subject.classification	Engineering--Petroleum	en_US
dc.title	Co-Injection of Non-Condensable Gas and Foam in SAGD using a Modified Well Configuration - A Simulation Study
dc.type	master thesis
thesis.degree.discipline	Chemical and Petroleum Engineering
thesis.degree.grantor	University of Calgary
thesis.degree.name	Master of Science (MSc)
ucalgary.item.requestcopy	true