PREDICTING POST BREAKTHROUGH PERFORMANCE OF WATER AND GAS CONING

Water coning is a serious issue for the oil and gas industry. This poses a big concern regarding the costs that to be incurred for separation and equipment capacity. Coning is the production of an unwanted phase with a desired phase. Over the years, many techniques and control methods has been birthed, however, the issue of coning can only be mitigated and not completely discharged. Reservoir and production engineers need to understand the basic framework; the parameters that greatly influence coning and how effective manipulation of it can deal with it. With the introduction of horizontal wells, the production rate is two to four times that of vertical wells, and coning is reduced and the breakthrough time is increased. Numerous papers has been written regarding to coning and vertical wells, only a few emphasize on horizontal wells and simultaneous water coning and gas coning. The objective of this research is to study the post breakthrough performance in simultaneous coning and a black oil simulator was use for the research. Sensitivity analysis was carried out on: the production rate of oil (qt), horizontal permeability, vertical permeability, perforation length, the height above perforation, extent of reservoir area and the formation porosity. A generalized correlation was developed for predicting coning behavior using non-linear analysis.