SPE-175127-MS

Forecasting of Steamflood Performance in a Heavy Oil Field

Eugene Rubin, and Omer Izgec, Chevron Energy Technology Company

Copyright 2015, Society of Petroleum Engineers

This paper was prepared for presentation at the SPE Annual Technical Conference and Exhibition held in Houston, Texas, USA, 28 30 September 2015.
This paper was selected for presentation by an SPE program committee following review of information contained in an abstract submitted by the author(s). Contents
of the paper have not been reviewed by the Society of Petroleum Engineers and are subject to correction by the author(s). The material does not necessarily reflect
any position of the Society of Petroleum Engineers, its officers, or members. Electronic reproduction, distribution, or storage of any part of this paper without the written
consent of the Society of Petroleum Engineers is prohibited. Permission to reproduce in print is restricted to an abstract of not more than 300 words; illustrations may
not be copied. The abstract must contain conspicuous acknowledgment of SPE copyright.

Abstract
Low oil recovery reached after more than 60 years of production in a rather deep heavy oil (9.5-11 API)
field in South America encourages looking for a thermal method (steamflood) which potentially promises
a tenfold increase in the recovery factor.
Steamflood forecasting for such a large field is highly challenging. Direct thermal reservoir simulation
seems impractical because of the size of the model (about 120 million grid-blocks). A recently developed
correlation-based probabilistic technique has met the forecasting challenge. First, a relatively small set of
thermal reservoir simulation runs with sector models provided a basis for production/injection correlations
between key rates as well as cumulative quantities and the models geologic and engineering input. All
the runs included pressure depletion and steamflood stages. Next, about 350 forecasting elements (1 sq.
km each) covered the entire Northern part of the field, which was subject of the forecasting; every element
received probabilistic distributions of the key geologic parameters involved in correlations. Then, the
Monte-Carlo simulation united the correlations with the distributions and allowed selecting combinations
of the parameters corresponding to P10-P50-P90 probabilities of the dynamic performance. Reconstruction of oil and water production as well as steam injection P10-P50-P90 time-profiles completed
preparation of the forecasting elements.
Reservoir depth and quality cut-offs restricted the area of the potential future steamflood application.
For several sets of the cut-offs, wells were placed within the areas in accordance with inverted 7-spot
patterns at either 8 or 24 acres/pattern. Every well adopted production or injection profiles from its
forecasting element-host. Drilling timetable controlled the wells coming on primary production. Steamflood started in a 100-pattern cluster after 4-5 years of primary production. Heat management governed
time-profile of steam injection into the cluster. On reaching a steam-oil-ratio cut-off, steam injection
shifted to the next 100-pattern cluster. Summarizing individual well production or injection time-profiles,
arranged in accordance with the drilling schedule, generated field P10-P50-P90 forecasts for several cases
of interest.

Introduction
Steamflood is one of the major enhanced-oil recovery (EOR) processes applied to heavy oil reservoirs.
Accurate prediction of steamflood performance is essential for solid economic decisions and proper
reservoir management. Analogs as well as numerical and analytical approaches usually serve this purpose.

SPE-175127-MS

Analogs are very difficult to use for steamflood forecasting because detailed information about
reservoir rock and fluid properties, well pattern size, type and placement, etc., strongly affecting the
process outcome, are usually unavailable. Analytical models are too simple to capture the effect of
heterogeneity and complex physics of the process. Jones method (1981, Jones et al) was one of the first
techniques combining physics of steamflood and empirical correlations. Previous efforts include Marx and
Langenheim (1959), Boberg (1966), Mandl and Volek (1969), Neuman (1975), Myhill and Stegemeier
(1978), Gomaa (1980) to name few. In 2007, Chandra and Mamora introduced an improved version of
Jones method by modifying some parameter definitions in the original model.
Another alternative, numerical reservoir simulation requires lengthy calculations because of the
challenging thermal formulations and necessity to use fine grids. Wei Wang et al. (2010) used the concepts
of Design of Experiments (DoE), proxy methods coupled with thermal reservoir simulation to forecast the
steamflood recovery of the Mukhaizna field of Oman. More recently, Osterloh et al. (2013) illustrated use
of thermal simulation in a complicated carbonate reservoir steamflood. Their paper highlighted the
probabilistic forecast of a large-scale pilot by capturing the reservoir heterogeneity, steamflood flow/
drainage mechanisms, and variety of operational constraints/decisions.
This study introduces a fast correlation-based probabilistic technique for forecasting of steamflood
applicable for large fields. A case study of X heavy oil field, located in South America, illustrates the
power of the method.
The subject heavy oil field was discovered in 1941 and put on production in 1948. It produces a 10.5
API heavy oil, viscosity of which ranges between 200 and 400 cP at reservoir conditions. There are two
main sand-rich formations in the field: Upper and Lower reservoirs separated by a shale unit; the
forecasting work described concerns only the Upper reservoir. The reservoir depth varies from about
4,000 feet subsea (ss) at the northeast to about 9,500 feet ss at the southwest. The recovery factor to-date
is about 6%.
Low oil recovery reached after more than 60 years of production encourages looking for an EOR
method (steamflood) which potentially promises a tenfold increase in recovery factor. Substantial depth
and reservoir pressure make thermal operations highly challenging even in the shallowest northeastern
part of the field. Piloting, starting from reservoir pressure depletion and ending with steamflood, is
considered necessary prior to commercial steamflood.

Pilot Thermal Simulation

A thermal sector model, gridded at 20x20m, served as the main reservoir simulation tool. It has two
hydrocarbon components (dead oil and methane). The reservoir depth varies significantly within confines
of the sector model (4,000 to 7,000 ft. ss) and initial reservoir temperature grows with depth. To improve
quality of the model initialization, every grid block received a value of the initial reservoir temperature
derived from the block depth and temperature depth-gradient:
(1)
where To is temperature at the surface (85F); gradT 0.0110F/ft - the reservoir temperature
depth-gradient (based in several MDT test data).
Calibration to primary production history provided the model with proper boundary conditions and
other important parameters.
Evaluation of the reservoir pressure depletion (not discussed here) recommended the following thermal
pilot configuration: two inverted 7-spot patterns of 8 acres each with a total of 17 wells including two
steam injectors, ten vertical producers, and five slant guard wells (Figure 1).

SPE-175127-MS

Figure 1Pilot well arrangement: two inverted 7-spot patterns surrounded by five slant guard wells

Average permeability depth-profiles helped identify three potential steam-chest intervals (steam
injection targets) in the Upper reservoir (Figure 2). The steam injection rates (based on preliminary runs
at max BHP only) were 1500, 500, and 500 CWE STB/D/W for A, B, and C intervals, respectively.

Figure 2Layer-averaged horizontal permeability and water saturation depth-profiles with steam injection intervals designated

Every thermal simulation run followed the history match period ending in Jan-2013. The existing wells
continued producing at liquid rates reported for Jan-2013. In 2016, pressure depletion stage started and
usually continued for four years (until reservoir pressure declined under 500 psia per operational
considerations). Steam injection began after pressure depletion and went on as per heat management
until a run ended. Separate sensitivity runs provided proper duration of injection rate plateau at 8 or 24
acres/pattern.
The first part of the study compares steamflood outcome in two locations within the model: challenging
3-43 and P99 as likely having nearly best combination of reservoir quality and hydrocarbon content.
The intent was to obtain a range of responses to steam injection. The following objective function helped
differentiate the reservoir quality:
(2)
where Fb is the objective function,
is the harmonic average of the vertical permeability, a is
the weighting factor, is the porosity, So is oil saturation, and h is the thickness.

SPE-175127-MS

Figure 3 shows that oil rate at P99 location is higher than that at 3-43 location in all times. Better
reservoir quality and higher hydrocarbon content of the former secured this difference. At either location,
oil rates sharply decline during pressure depletion stage and rise soon after steam injection start. At P99
location, oil rate peaks at 150-160 STB/Day/Well; at either location, peak of oil rate during steamflood
is higher than that before injection start by a factor of 2 to 3.

Figure 3Comparison of pilot oil rates at 3-43 and P99 locations of the Upper reservoir

Figure 4 shows that steam chest does develop in the challenging 3-43 location, somewhat cooling
down after the heat management start. Model probes indicated oil viscosity to have reduced from the
initial 450 cP to about 20 cP inside the steam chest.

Figure 4 Steam chest development at 3-43 location of the Upper reservoir

Combined, primary production (four-year-long reservoir pressure depletion stage) and following
20-year-long steamflood can provide decent oil recovery ranging (in these cases) from 0.37 to 0.45.
Recovery during depletion stage plays an important role: it gives 50 to 75% of the total cumulative oil
production. Relatively high (although declining) reservoir pressure makes a significant contribution into
the primary production recovery during pressure depletion; on the contrary, this factor is practically mute
during steamflood leaving the gravity drainage to be practically the only driving mechanism.

Field Steamflood Forecast

Steamflood forecasting for the Northern part of the X field is highly challenging. Direct thermal reservoir
simulation seems impractical in this case because of the required size of the model (about 120 million
grid-blocks) resulting from (1) large subject area and (2) strict limitations on a grid block dimensions in

SPE-175127-MS

thermal simulation. A recently developed correlation-based probabilistic technique has met the forecasting
challenge. Several other Chevron assets have successfully applied the technique. The method uses regular
computational power; it includes geologic variances and operational uncertainties. Figure 5 displays the
technique workflow.

Figure 5Workflow of correlation-based probabilistic forecasting technique

A relatively small set of thermal reservoir simulation runs provided a basis for production/injection
correlations between key items of the models output (rates, cumulative quantities, ratios) and the models
geologic and engineering input.
About 350 forecasting elements (1 sq. km each) covered the entire Northern part of the field. Every
element received probabilistic distributions of the key geologic parameters involved in correlations (after
filtering out too deep and/or too poor quality areas of the reservoir). The Monte-Carlo simulation united
the correlations with the distributions and allowed selecting combinations of the parameters corresponding
to P10-P50-P90 probabilities of the dynamic performance. Reconstruction of individual well oil and water
production as well as steam injection time-profiles completed preparation of the forecasting elements.
The final stage building the forecast itself resulted from combining well locations and production/
injection time-profiles with well drilling timetable and general constraints.
Sensitivity Simulation Runs
All the runs included pressure depletion and steamflood stages. Steam injection started after reservoir
pressure depletion and went on at the target rate under a max BHP constraint of 650 psia. In the Upper
reservoir, steam injection targeted three intervals with a 60-20-20% split. After several years of injection
at the plateau, heat management began cutting the rate.
Every run contained pilots at P25, P50, P75, and P99 locations of the basic objective function. Analysis
of output quantities of the respective material balance regions provided the run results.
Algebraic functions approximated the runs output. Objective of the approximation was to smooth the
results often distorted by simulation fluctuations, as well as select and train the most appropriate functions
for future application in the forecast.
Production Correlations
A fundamental (for this forecasting technique) idea of reconstructing production (or injection) timeprofiles based on a few key points necessitated correlating the latter with geologic and engineering input
parameters. As the Figure 6 shows, the key points for the oil production include max oil rate, time when
the max rate occurs, and cumulative oil production by the end of period of interest. Time profile
reconstruction fits known algebraic functions to the key points in such a way as to honor cumulative
quantities and satisfy rate and time constraints.

SPE-175127-MS

Figure 6 Oil Production time-profiles with key points designated (schematic)

A total of 44 simulation runs (22 for 8 acres/pattern, and 22 for 24 acres/pattern) constituted the basis
for production correlations. They included the key points for both steamflood and primary production
stages. As an example, Figure 7 shows some of recovery factor correlations. Probabilistic sampling (with
a triangular distribution in most cases) provided a response where a range rather than a single-line
correlation was the case.

Figure 7Some of steamflood oil recovery factor correlations

Among other things, the correlations led to the following observations:

Steam injection strongly affects oil recovery factor and water production;
Steamflood and primary recovery factors are of the same order of magnitude in this case.
Steamflood correlations accounted for the fact that in sector model simulation, wells produce a mixture
of cold oil from outside of the two patterns involved and steam-affected oil from inside those, whereas
in commercial development wells would normally produce only steam-affected oil (except those on the
boundary).
Distribution of Geologic Parameters
Forecasting elements (one sq. km each) covered the entire Northern part of the field, which was the subject
of forecasting. For every element, the global field coarse geo-model provided a basis for calculating the
average geologic parameters involved in the correlations. By design, the technique uses probabilistic
distributions rather than single average values of the geo-parameters; a separate branch of geo-statistical

SPE-175127-MS

work would normally generate these distributions. Here, random-number generator produced the required
distributions based on the above average values and their assumed triangular type of the distribution
frequency. For most of the parameters, min, mode, and max values equaled 0.5, 1.0, and 1.5 of the
average; permeability received a wider asymmetrical range 0.25, 1.0, and 3.0 of the average (Figure 8).
Well Performance

Figure 8 Hypothetical distributions of porosity (left) and permeability with average values designated

The objective of this part of the work was generating time-profiles corresponding to P10-P50-P90
performance of a single production or injection well for every forecasting element (all the wells within a
given element were assumed to perform identically to each other). Monte-Carlo simulation (usually 1000
realizations) combined the correlations with distributions of geologic and of engineering parameters
involved. Every iteration included calculations of Discounted Net Cumulative Oil Production (DNCOP),
which served as a metric to select P10-P50-P90 realizations (Figure 9). DNCOP accounted for oilequivalent of fuel required to generate a unit of steam; it used a 10% annual time-discounting (variable
DiscRate, Equation 3).

Figure 9 DNCOP distribution for a forecasting element

(3)

Reconstruction of production and injection time profiles followed the selection of P10-P50-P90
realizations. It used geologic and engineering parameters as well as the key profile points of the

SPE-175127-MS

Monte-Carlo realizations chosen in combination with the algebraic formulas developed and trained during
analysis of the reservoir simulation results. As an example, Figure 10 displays single well P10-P50-P90
oil production and steam injection profiles reconstructed for a forecasting element. Such profiles became
building blocks of the steamflood forecasts.

Figure 10 Reconstructed Oil Production (left) and Steam Injection Time-Profiles for a Forecasting Element

Steamflood Target Areas

Sharp contrast in oil production rates observed at 3-43 and P99 locations seems to offer two general
options in steamflood of the field:
Steamflood includes the entire reservoir within accessible depth. This implies more wells, higher
CAPEX, lower average production rate per well, relatively low dependence on geo-modeling
quality.
Steamflood includes only reservoir of a certain grade within accessible depth. This implies fewer
wells, lower CAPEX, higher average production rate per well, relatively high dependence on
geo-modeling quality.
As the Upper reservoir with option two had been the choice, both reservoir depth (shallower than 6000
feet ss, Figure 11) and quality (grade) constrained steamflood target areas. Basic objective function (a
linear combination of average vertical permeability and hydrocarbon content, Equation 2) represented the
reservoir quality (Figure 12). Comparison of these plots shows that the depth limitation forces the future
potential steamflood to deal with reservoir of relatively poor quality and relatively low hydrocarbon
content. Indeed, the area shallower than 6000 feet ss occupies the north-northeast corner of the field where
all the metrics of the reservoir quality are challenging; the latter noticeably improves towards deeper areas
in the south-southeast.

SPE-175127-MS

Figure 11Upper Reservoir Depth Map

Figure 12Upper Reservoir Maps of Basic Objective Function (top) and its Components: Average Vertical Permeability (bottom left)
and Hydrocarbon Content

Distribution of OIP (Figure 13) among intervals of reservoir depth and of reservoir grade helped
quantify the above conclusion. Cumulative probability curve of the basic objective function, calculated for
every grid column, provided reservoir quality values to mark the selected reservoir grades: 25, 50, and
75% (Figure 14).

10

SPE-175127-MS

Figure 13Upper Boscn OIP Map

Figure 14 Distribution of Basic Objective Function

Figure 15 depicts distributions of the Upper reservoir OIP among intervals of reservoir depth and
quality. As one can see, the Upper reservoir shallower than 6000 feet subsea possesses only a small
portion of the OIP (about 10%). About 70% of that amount belongs to the reservoir grade higher than
25%.

Figure 15OIP in Reservoir Grade and Depth Intervals

SPE-175127-MS

11

Well Placement
Prepared were the following six steamflood forecasts (for the Northern part of the field) within Upper
reservoir depths equal to or shallower than 6000 feet ss:
Reservoir grade P25 or better at 8 and 24 acres/pattern
Reservoir grade from P25 to P50 at 8 and 24 acres/pattern
Reservoir grade P50 or better at 8 and 24 acres/pattern
As an example, Figure 16 depicts placement of vertical wells targeting reservoir grade P50 or better
at depths shallower than 6,000 feet subsea.

Figure 16 Wells targeting reservoir grade P50 or better at depths shallower than 6,000 feet subsea

Well Drilling Timetables and Steamflood Staging/Management

Well drilling timetable prepared for every stage of every case controls how fast wells can be drilled and
come on-line. As an example, Figure 17 shows cumulative number of wells drilled for stage 1 of P25 case
at 8 acres/pattern. Drilling of 1,120 producers, 453 injectors, and 227 observation wells continued for 12
years (with 12 rigs employed and about a month required to drill and tie-in a single well.)

12

SPE-175127-MS

Figure 17Cumulative Number of Wells Drilled for Stage 1 of P25 Case at 8 acres/pattern

For every case, Table 1 summarizes the number of wells to drill (in total and per stage). For either
pattern size, the number of wells decreases from P25-or-better case to P25-to-P50 case to P50-or-better
case. Especially noticeable reduction occurs between P25-to-P50 and P50-or-better cases indicating that
areas with P50-or-better quality occupy a relatively small fraction of the entire area shallower than 6000
feet subsea.

Table 1Well Count

Total
Pattern size,
acres/pattern
8

24

Stage 1

Stage 2

Stage 3

Case

Prod

Inj

Obs

Obs

Obs

P50 or better
P25 to P50
P25 or better
P50 or better
P25 to P50
P25 or better

699
2290
2654
175
627
775

245
831
1058
53
182
263

411
824
1120
109
242
340

157
293
453
38
67
113

79
147
227
19
34
57

40
692
680
6
173
186

10
223
229
1
41
46

5
112
115
1
21
23

248
774
854
60
212
249

78
315
376
14
74
104

39
158
188
7
37
52

As one can notice, wells in neighboring cases do not sum up precisely. For example, total number of
producers in P25-or-better case at 8 acres/pattern is 2,654 whereas a sum of the two complementary cases
(P25-to-P50 and P50-or-better) provides 2,989 (2,290699) producers. This discrepancy resulted from
the necessity of proper handling boundary wells and/or of having all the patterns closed.
There are three stages in each case organized for better steamflood management (Figure 18);
boundaries between the stages have remained the same in all cases. Steamflood always begins from stage
1, then moves to stage 2 and, finally, to stage 3; however, every stage has its own steam generation plant
with 250 CWE MSTB/Day capacity. Within every stage, drilling of wells starts from the south-southwest
and moves towards the north-northeast. Targeting better quality reservoir first is the driver behind this
strategy.

SPE-175127-MS

13

Figure 18 Steamflood stages (reservoir grade P25-or-better at 8 acres/pattern as an example)

Within each stage, groups unite wells whereas clusters embrace the groups. A single group contains
up to 100 producers and up to 50 injectors; a cluster usually includes 100 patterns. Primary production of
a group starts as soon as all the wells of the group are drilled and tied-in. Steamflood begins after all the
wells of a cluster have been on primary production for at least 4 years. At plateau, steam injection rate
is about 2500 CWE STB/Day/Well. Heat management controls steam injection cuts. SOR reaching a
cut-off value terminates steam injection into the current 100-patterns cluster under the steamflood. As
soon as steam becomes available (due to the heat management or reaching SOR cut-off value), new
patterns come under steam injection from the next cluster.
Forecast Results
As an example, Figure 19 shows P50 steam injection and oil production profiles for a case with the
reservoir grade P25-or-better at 8 acres/pattern. The figure combines all the three stages, whereas Figure
20 to 22 display performances of the individual stages involved.

Figure 19 Northern X P50 of steam injection (top) and oil production for reservoir grade P25-or-better at 8 acres/pattern

14

SPE-175127-MS

Figure 20 Stage 1 P50 of Steam Injection (left) and Oil Production for Reservoir Grade P25-or-better at 8 acres/pattern

Figure 21Stage 2 P50 of Steam Injection (left) and Oil Production for Reservoir Grade P25-or-better at 8 acres/pattern

Figure 22P50 of Steam Injection (left) and Oil Production for Reservoir Grade P25-or-better at 8 acres/pattern

Figure 20 (left), for example, clearly differentiates steam injection into 4 clusters (there are 4
maxima of the steam injection rate). Table 1 indicates that stage 1 of this case has 453 injectors, which
transforms into about 4.5 100-pattern clusters seen on the figure. Figure 21 and 22 provide similar
information about stages 2 and 3 having 229 and 376 injectors (patterns), respectively. The fact that every

SPE-175127-MS

15

stage has its own steam plant contributed into configuration of the total steam injection profile (Figure 19).
Oil profiles show primary production rate (reflecting drilling activity, which brings well groups on
primary production) and steamflood as well as total rate and cumulative productions. The production
profiles result from the reservoir quality, the number of wells involved, and the amount of steam injected.
Figure 23 and Figure 24 and Table 2 present cumulative oil production and steam injection for all the
cases. The Figures and Table show that cumulative steam injections and steamflood/total oil productions
at 8 acres/pattern noticeably exceed those at 24 acres/pattern. More wells involved and better conditions
for steamflood are responsible for this.

Figure 23Primary, Steamflood, and Total Cumulative Oil Productions at 8 acres/pattern

Figure 24 Primary, Steamflood, and Total Cumulative Oil Productions at 24 acres/pattern

16

SPE-175127-MS

Table 2Forecast Cumulative Oil Production and Steam Injection

CUMULATIVE OIL PRODUCTION/STEAM INJECTION AT 8 ACRES/PATTERN, MMSTB
Reservoir Quality
P25 or better

P25 to P50

P50 or better

QUANTITY

P10

P50

P90

P10

P50

P90

P10

P50

P90

Primary Oil
Steamflood Oil
Total Oil
Steam Injection
Steamflood SOR

120.8
104.2
225.0
1224.0
11.7

174.7
165.0
339.7
2261.5
13.7

236.3
276.9
513.3
2980.2
10.8

73.8
70.2
144.0
1518.9
21.6

110.4
110.6
221.0
1855.5
16.8

154.7
177.8
332.5
2400.4
13.5

47.3
54.0
101.3
661.6
12.2

75.9
79.5
155.4
739.3
9.3

110.7
132.2
242.9
700.7
5.3

CUMULATIVE OIL PRODUCTION/STEAM INJECTION AT 24 ACRES/PATTERN, MMSTB

Reservoir Quality
P25 or better

P25 to P50

P50 or better

QUANTITY

P10

P50

P90

P10

P50

P90

P10

P50

P90

Primary Oil
Steamflood Oil
Total Oil
Steam Injection
Steamflood SOR

93.5
48.4
141.9
717.4
14.8

161.0
74.4
235.4
979.9
13.2

246.4
129.2
375.6
1050.9
8.1

54.6
30.5
85.1
536.9
17.6

86.2
46.6
132.8
760.7
16.3

142.1
61.4
203.5
449.6
7.3

33.3
22.4
55.7
196.2
8.8

62.6
36.8
99.4
226.1
6.1

85.5
55.9
141.3
203.1
3.6

In addition, at 8 acres/pattern primary production and steamflood divide the total cumulative oil
recovery approximately in two, whereas at 24 acres/pattern primary production provides about 23 of the
total amount. It is not surprising because increase in pattern size reduces well interference and improves
conditions for primary production; the same makes steamflood more difficult at 24 acres/pattern because
of retarded communication between injectors and producers and reduction of steam injection per unit of
area (well target steam injection rate remains unchanged regardless of pattern size).
Upper reservoir ultimate recovery factors may reach 40-50%. Cumulative steam-oil ratios (Table 2)
undoubtedly indicate that steamflood in the reservoir will be challenging. This results from relatively low
steam injectivity and modest thermal response due to rather poor reservoir quality at the shallow part of
the field.

Conclusions
This paper introduced a new correlation-based probabilistic technique for steamflood forecasting in large
fields. The case study discussed here illustrated the power of the method. Following conclusions are
warranted based on this study:
Modeling of steamflood pilot demonstrated a noticeably better performance at P99 location as
compared to that at 3-43 location. Higher permeability and hydrocarbon content as well as fewer
potential barriers to vertical flow secured this outcome.
Correlation-based probabilistic technique has met the challenge of building the steamflood field
forecasts
Upper reservoir ultimate recovery factors may reach 40-50%.
Cumulative steam injections and steamflood/total oil productions at 8 acres/pattern noticeably
exceed those at 24 acres/pattern.
Primary oil production contributes about of the ultimate recovery at 8 acres/pattern and about 23
of the ultimate recovery at 24 acres/pattern.

SPE-175127-MS

17

Relatively high cumulative steam-oil-ratios indicate that steamflood in the Upper reservoir will be
challenging because of relatively low steam injectivity and modest thermal response due to rather
poor reservoir quality at the shallow part of the field.

References
Jones, J. 1981. Steam Drive Model for Hand-Held Programmable Calculators. JPT 32 (2): 325332.
SPE-6169-PA.
Marx, J.W., and Langenheim, R.H. 1959. Reservoir Heating by Hot Fluid Injection, Trans, AIME 216:
312315.
Mandl, G., and Volek, C.W. 1967. Heat and Mass Transport in Steam-Drive Processes. Paper SPE
1986 presented at the Fall Meeting of the Society of Petroleum Engineers of AIME, New Orleans,
1 4 October.
Neuman, C.H. 1974. A Mathematical Model of the Steam Drive Process Applications. Paper SPE
4757 presented at the SPE Improved Oil Recovery Symposium, Tulsa, 2224 April.
Myhill, N.A., and Stegemeier, G. L. 1978. Steam-Drive Correlation and Prediction. JPT 30 (2):
173182. SPE-5572-PA.
Gomaa, E.E. 1980. Correlations for Predicting Oil Recovery by Steam-flood. JPT 32 (2): 325332.
SPE-6169-PA.
Chandras, S., Mamora, D.D. 2007. Improved Stemaflood Analytical Model. SPEREE 10 (6): 638
643. SPE-97870-PA.
Wang, Wei., Zhang, E., Fitchen, B. 2010. Novel Methodology for Full-Field Production Forecasting
in a Large Steamflood Project in Sultanate of Oman. Paper SPE 129501 presented at the SPE EOR
Conference at Oil & Gas West Asia, Muscat, Sultanate of Oman, 1113 April.
Osterloh, W.T., Mims, D.S., Meddaugh, W. S. Probabilistic Forecasting and Model Validation for the
First-Eocene Large-Scale Pilot Steamflood, Partitioned Zone, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. 2013.
SPEREE 16 (01): 97116. SPE-150580-PA.