Visualizing flow patterns in coupled geomechanical simulation using streamlines

摘要

Reservoir geomechanics is a production induced phenomena that is experiencedin large number of fields around the world. Hydrocarbon production changes the porepressure which in turn alters the in-situ stress state. For reservoirs that are either stresssensitive or where rock is soft and unconsolidated, stresses have appreciable effect onrock properties like porosity and permeability. Anisotropic and isotropic permeabilitychanges affect flow direction and movement of flood front thereby influencing wellperformance and reservoir productivity. Coupling of geomechanical calculation withmulti-phase flow calculation is needed to make prudent predictions about the reservoirproduction and recovery. The post processing tools provided with the simulators cannotmonitor flood front movement and fail to capture important information like flowdirectionality and dominant phase in a flow. Geomechanical simulation is combined withstreamline tracing to aid in better understanding of the reservoir dynamics throughvisualization of flow patterns in the reservoir. Streamline tracing is a proved reservoirengineering tool that is widely used by industry experts to capture information on floodmovement, injector-producer relations and swept area. In the present research, we have incorporated total velocity streamlines and phasestreamlines for coupled geomechanical simulation and compared the results withstreamline tracing for conventional reservoir simulator to explain geomechanics behavioron reservoir flow processes in a more detailed and appealing manner. Industry standardsimulators are used for coupled geomechanical simulation and conventional simulationand streamline tracing has been done through in-house tracing code.The research demonstrates the benefits and power of streamline tracing invisualizing flow patterns through work on two cases; first, a synthetic case for studyingwater injection in a five spot pattern and second, a SPE 9th comparative study. Theresearch gives encouraging results by showing how geomechanics influences reservoirflow paths and reservoir dynamics through visualization of flow. The streamlinescaptures flow directionality, information regarding appearance and disappearance of gasphase and the connectivity between injector and producer.