PREDICTING POST BREAKTHROUGH PERFORMANCE OF WATER AND GAS CONING

Water coning is a serious issue for the oil and gas industry. This poses a big
concern regarding the costs that to be incurred for separation and equipment
capacity. Coning is the production of an unwanted phase with a desired phase. Over
the years, many techniques and control methods has been birthed, however, the issue
of coning can only be mitigated and not completely discharged. Reservoir and
production engineers need to understand the basic framework; the parameters that
greatly influence coning and how effective manipulation of it can deal with it. With the
introduction of horizontal wells, the production rate is two to four times that of
vertical wells, and coning is reduced and the breakthrough time is increased.
Numerous papers has been written regarding to coning and vertical wells, only a few
emphasize on horizontal wells and simultaneous water coning and gas coning. The
objective of this research is to study the post breakthrough performance in
simultaneous coning and a black oil simulator was use for the research. Sensitivity
analysis was carried out on: the production rate of oil (qt), horizontal permeability,
vertical permeability, perforation length, the height above perforation, extent of
reservoir area and the formation porosity. A generalized correlation was developed
for predicting coning behavior using non-linear analysis.