Unconventional Wisdom
Reservoir and reservoir fluid heterogeneities are ubiquitous in heavy oil and oil sand (HOOS) reservoirs, and impact recovery processes such as steam assisted gravity drainage (SAGD) that depend on uniform oil mobility for optimal recovery. Variations in oil mobility (the ratio of oil permeability to oil viscosity) vertically and laterally throughout a reservoir impact optimal recovery process design, well placement, and field management.
With process optimization, detailed fluid mobility logs and maps are needed, based on high resolution core analysis and viscosity logs. Additionally, HOOS oil compositional variations provide means to document mass transport efficiency within a reservoir due to biodegradation and can be used to assess reservoir connectivity(i.e. are reservoirs compartmentalized by faults or shales?) or they can be used to chemically monitor progress of production across a reservoir by analysis of produced oils.
When you customizing well placements and operating strategies to actual oil mobility variations in the reservoir at both reservoir and steam temperature conditions one can greatly optimize production strategies with a process we call Geotailoring.
At Gushor, we specialize in high resolution fluid property characterization, and reservoir simulation services for integrated geotailoring, providing clients with a unique and effective route to raising productivity and efficiency throughout the heavy oil or bitumen recovery process.
