SUPERIOR HORIZONTAL WELL PLACEMENT YIELDS IMPRESSIVE PRODUCTION INCREASE IN MATURE FIELD BY USING MULTIDISCIPLINED APPROACH COMBINING DEEP-AZIMUTHAL RESISTIVITY AND CONTINUOUS SURVEY MONITORING USING DOWN-HOLE BENDING MOMENT AND BENDING TOOL-FACE MEASUREMENTS IN A ROTARY STEERABLE DRILLING SYSTEM

摘要

A recent project initiated to drill shallow horizontal wells in California, USA for Macpherson Oil Co. utilized a customized package of solutions and technologies that were developed to drill horizontal wells in the field while improving production. After completing one third of the initial horizontal development, the current production is the highest the field has seen in 72 years. Highly precise wellbore placement, in conjunction with robust real-time logging information,were sighted as the primary reasons for the success of the operation thus far. To achieve optimized wellbore placement, the following processes were used: 1) Real-time three-dimensional reservoir navigation drilling systems helped to visualize and interpret the large volume of available information, reduce well-placement uncertainty, and estimate distanceto- bed boundaries with high confidence by using formation evaluation data such as azimuthal resistivity, gamma imaging, etc. 2) Deep-azimuthal resistivity service to provide formation evaluation information in threedimensional reservoir navigation 3) Economical usage of rotary steerable systems in a land-based application, with a smooth wellbore to facilitate completion 4) Real-time continuous survey calculation while drilling using continuous downhole bending moment and bending tool-face measurements for superior well placement with rotary steerable systems. This continuous downhole survey measurement, unaffected by magnetic interference from nearby offset casing, helped place wells closer to offsets, maximizing the density of horizontal wellbores that can be drilled 5) Real-time drilling dynamics for optimum drilling parameters to maximize steering efficiency and improve well placement 6) Introduction of new survey-management services to reduce wellbore uncertainty and increase room for more horizontal wells with more effective and efficient usage of the field and its future potential Further development of the field will include the examination of technologies that are still at the inception stage but hold potential for development and execution in these operations. For the intents and purposes of this paper, the names of geological identifiers, formation information, and well names will be assigned arbitrary naming conventions to protect the anonymity of those we choose to reference.