Two deterministic methodologies for estimation of OGIP by production dynamics diagnostic of gas-condensate reservoir

Abstract

This study presents two independent methodologies for estimation of original gas in place (OGIP) by production dynamics diagnostic of gas-condensate reservoir with no-flow outer boundary based on black-oil concept. Classic Blasingame decline-type curves are also extended to apply in gas-condensate reservoir to calculate kh. Both numerically simulated case and field data are used to demonstrate the applicability and validity of proposed methodologies.

One method develops a novel analytical model to obtain average reservoir pressure, OGIP and Diatz shape factor at the same time by coupling flow equation of gas-condensate reservoir for boundary dominated flow (BDF) and general material balance equation (GMBE). The two-phase variable-rate flow equation at late time for BDF is clearly and concisely derived in this study in terms of defined two-phase pseodopressure and two-phase material balance pseudotime. In addition, another innovative, simple and effective method for estimation of OGIP is proposed in this study requiring input data of only cumulative production of well and reservoir fluid PVT characteristics of Constant Volume Depletion (CVD) experiment. The fundamental concept of this method suggests that transient cumulative production GOR is determined by only current gas recovery degree and fluid PVT characteristics of the reservoir. Due to the accurate, simple and relaxed data-requiring nature of this method, widespread use in field to estimate OGIP of gas-condensate reservoir is potentially encouraging. On the contrary, if OGIP is already known, an intermediate equation of the method can also be applied to check accuracy of CVD experiment results from laboratory.

The first methodology extends OGIP estimation to gas-condensate reservoir from Blasingame and Lee (1988)’s method for dry-gas reservoir. Often used two-phase z factor, which is inconvenient to evaluate and easy to yield error, for gas-condensate reservoir in material balance equation is avoided in this methodology by applying more analytical and accurate Walsh et al. (1994)’s GMBE instead. The second methodology, to the authors’ knowledge, is the first proposed allowing OGIP estimation of gas condensate reservoir without requiring bottom hole flowing pressure (BHFP), pressure tests and complex calculation.