Save the DATE!It will be our pleasure to host SPE Distinguished Lecturer–Dr. Luis Quintero with a virtual visit with our section to present his paper "To increase production, listen to your well!"
SPE Distinguished Lecturers are industry experts and outstanding speakers, nominated by their peers, to share their knowledge and expertise on the latest industry trends and technologies with SPE members throughout the world through visits to local sections.
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Abstract
Reading a book is great. Listening to a story is even better. A similar situation happens in a well. Active wells produce a series of sounds downhole. Understanding the source of these sounds helps tremendously in the optimization of the well's performance.
Production gaps are due to many causes, one of which is crossflow. The crossflow can be between pipes, past a sealing element, in the cement-formation interface, etc. Since the leak flow is a dynamic phenomena, it seems appropriate to obtain dynamic data to understand it. Fluids moving behind pipe create friction, turbulence and … sound. The well talks to us, and we should listen!
Optimization of production rates with minimum intervention expenditures requires a reduction in the uncertainty associated with the diagnostics of the root causes of the production gap. If as mentioned above, the cause is a leak, the effectiveness of a waterflood, for example, would rely heavily on the accurate diagnosis of such a leak.
A very comprehensive example of an injector well on a onshore mature oil field is shown to illustrate how listening to the well, plus the integration of multiple dynamic and static downhole logs dramatically reduced the uncertainty of the location of the crossflow. Only a fraction of the water injected was helping to produce the oil out, while the rest was accumulating (wasted) in a shallower zone. The economic impact of accurate leak detection cannot be emphasized enough. Fortunately we listened to the well!
Biography:
Luis F Quintero is Halliburton's Chief Advisor, Production Management. He holds a BS in Electrical Engineering from USB - Venezuela, Msc and PhD in Petroleum Engineering from LSU. His career spans 30 years in well logging, reservoir engineering, and production management in 30 countries. Luis has evaluated production gaps for fields in USA, Latin-America, Africa, Former Soviet Union, Asia and Middle East. He is a member of SPE's Legion of Volunteers, has been a Technical Editor of SPE Reservoir Evaluation, and the winner of SPE’s International PhD Student Contest. Luis has co-authored more than 30 technical papers and 11 patents.