An Infinitely Variable Choke for Multi-Zone Intelligent Well Completions

摘要

State-of-the-art completion technologies to more efficientlyrnsupport the needs of the oilfield continue to be developed.Forrnexam le,intelligent completion techniques,which arerndesigned to allow the operator to reconfigure well architecturernwithout well intervention,have gained a great deal of attentionrnbecause of their capabilities to improve monitoring and overallrnwell erformance in multi-zone oil and gas fieldrndevelo ments.In all of these multi-zone intelligent-wellrncom letions,flow adjusting and monitoring devices or intervalrncontrol valves are located between zonal isolation packers torncontrol flow into or out of each zone.rnThe first generation of these interval control valves was arnchoke that offered only four ositions.To overcome thernosition limitations,an infinitely variable choke has now beenrndesigned.The requirements for this next-generation intervalrncontrol valve provided many design challenges.This aperrndescribes the design,development and testing of a metal-to-rnmetal sealing,infinitely variable downhole choke with truernosition sensing ca ability.All to ics from the conce tualrndesign and customer requirements to accelerated erosionrntesting and component life predictions will be discussed.rnTesting has verified that the new interval control valve canrnsupport the needs of the multi-zone well com letion.This newrntechnology has been installed in a Statoil water injection well.