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A better path to oil and gas shale production

By using gamma ray emitters, well operations can analyse conditions underground and more effectively get to the product.

 

Knowing how to measure the units of natural resources in a wellbore project is a must and technology has made this process a whole lot easier. This inexpensive technology provides confirmation that a wellbore is open to flow, identifies and quantifies stage flow contribution of each phase, and provides measurement of drainage area connectivity — simply by adding small amounts of unique chemical tracers to each stage’s stimulation fluid.

To see the zonal productivity and the area of where the well will be based, understanding independent stage production is essential. Using this knowledge, future well development plans can be adjusted with confidence to ensure that any changes made will result in enhanced hydrocarbon recovery.

Stimulating a well in the correct position can be hard to get right, but with new methods, this can be made a much simpler process. This includes seismic, micro-seismic, core, and multiple specialist log data sets. Historically, it has been difficult to place faith in surveillance data to vary future drilling or stimulation activities. At best, there was no confirmation that recovery would improve if the data was used to change the program design. Or worse still, one data set was inconsistent with another, leaving the operator unsure which to believe. Tracerco technology offers a method to prove the accuracy of these measurements, providing operators with confidence when planning future well and field development.

Gamma ray (GR) heat maps are designed to determine the situation below the ground once the wellbore project begins. Red signals that the drill is below the target area and blue means that it has hit the middle area. These GR observations support geological expectations.

During different stages of wellbore drilling, when the colour changes to blue, it shows that water is running, while when the colour is red, cumulative gas is being produced. When organisations drill outside of zone low (toe stages), it commonly results in reduced gas production and increased water production. Drilling out of zone high (middle stages) was not detrimental. These types of stages show effective hydrocarbon production without suffering from increased water. Armed with this knowledge and by incorporating real time GR monitoring during drilling, operators can become better positioned to efficiently complete future wells in the field and remain in the more productive rock.

Offset wells are those that are built above another, classed as a ‘parent well’, and through research it has been suggested that more hydrocarbon is produced in these situations. Also note the increased production from stages in the centre section of the horizontals that was believed to result from accessing rock, not previously produced by the parent well.

Tracerco, a waterflood and injection gas flow monitoring specialist, has a frack tracer which they say can help project leads view various stages of a wellbore production. According to them, by using this knowledge the operator can evaluate drilling, stimulation and production decisions, and extract the full benefit of pre-completion seismic and geophysical diagnostics (seismic, log, micro seismic, landing zone, etc.) to ensure enhanced ultimate hydrocarbon recovery.

This article is by copywriter Georgie White on behalf of Tracerco.





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