Estimating Residual Fracture Pore Volume by Analyzing PostFlowback Water Production: An Eagle Ford Black-Oil Case

摘要

We analyzed flowback (FB) and post-flowback (PFB) production data from six multi-fractured horizontal wells completed in Eagle Ford Formation. The wells are supercharged at the beginning of the flowback process and the reservoir pressure remains above bubble point during the post-flowback period. Interestingly, we observe a pronounced unit slope (pseudo-steady state) in the rate-normalized pressure (RNP) plots of water for post-flowback period, while such unit slope is not observed for the flowback period. We developed a conceptual and mathematical model to describe these observations and to estimate the average fracture pore volume (Vf) during the post-flowback process. This model assumes no water influx from matrix into the fracture system, which is consistent with the lack of mobile water in the target reservoir. It also assumes stable influx of oil from matrix into the fracture system with insignificant mass accumulation of oil in the fracture system. Therefore, water production at pseudo-steady state conditions occurs under the driving forces of water expansion, oil expansion, and fracture closure. We also performed decline curve analysis on water production data to estimate initial Vf, as the fractures tend to be fully saturated with water at the beginning of the flowback process. The difference between ultimate water recovery and average Vf from the PFB model represents the loss in fracture volume due to fracture closure. The results show that about 65% of fracture closure occurs after 7 months of PFB production. Fracture closure is the dominant drive mechanism during FB and early PFB periods when reservoir pressure drops rapidly.