Data used by permission of the owner.
Oil and gas production data is key to understanding the impact development decisions have on reservoir performance. Monitoring production data over the life of a field facilitates the predicted performance of planned wells to be assessed alongside their observed counterparts. Software that can correlate and visualize—using 3D and 4D time-lapse data—to provide a clearer understanding of the movement and changes of fluids within a reservoir, in the context of individual wells, is a critical tool for understanding field performance. This level of insight enables production engineers to rapidly address any unforeseen scenarios and thereby optimize subsequent production decisions.
Assess Oil and Gas Production Data in Context
Traditionally, oil and gas production data is accessed in isolation using 2D plots of fluids and attributes for an individual well and sets or patterns of wells over time. This approach is useful for tracking production at an individual well but fails to look at production in its full geospatial context. A more powerful alternative is to visualize oil and gas production data in 3D/4D to provide contextual visualization regarding factors influencing the production rate. The capability to integrate other relevant data in a single collaborative visualization environment, allows teams to spatially understand and quantitatively assess the causes and effects of unexpected or unpredicted production rate changes.
A cursory inspection of subsurface data, often in an entirely different software package, without access to a visual display of production rates may not provide a true understanding of the reservoir dynamics. This may lead to the inability to understand how production is being affected by subsurface factors that may be influencing fluid flow. Software with a temporal production data visualized cleanly, for example as vertical towers that denote changing values over time, provides a detailed understanding of communication in a reservoir to guide production decisions.
Cylindrical orange towers represent water injection in context with temporal completions, 4D seismic, and water saturation in the reservoir simulation model. Data used by permission of the owner.
Oil and Gas Production Data: North Sea Use Case
The North Sea example shown above illustrates the value of combining injection data, represented as cylindrical orange towers, 4D time-lapse seismic, predictive simulation data, and the location of perforations in the well. This detailed, integrated visualization enabled the reservoir management team to quickly understand and rectify an issue of blocked perforations when the observed seismic did not match the expected water flood calculated by the reservoir simulation model.
Visualizing relevant data together over time revealed a long-term decline in injected water volume. Displaying pressure data as animated towers also revealed that the perforations were progressively getting blocked. The failure of water injection into reservoir sand resulted in dropping formation pressure. Hence, the discrepancy in the 4D seismic response versus the reservoir simulation prediction. The well received a workover to reestablish water injection and improve production.
Maximize the Value of Oil and Gas Production Data
As Nirina Haller, Lead Geophysicist at AkerBP says “Visualizing production data in a dynamic manner alongside spatial information, such as structure and wells, is the most efficient way of communicating field history. At Valhall, we can communicate to partners, the asset management team or non- geoscience disciplines (drilling, completions, etc.), more than 30 years of production with several periods of water injection thanks to a two-minute movie. The depletion strategy gets clearly demonstrated as well as the improvements in technology through time (from vertical to deviated wells and now extended reach horizontal wells). Production data visualization can also trigger dedicated 4D analysis, for example when it comes to explain water breakthrough or to differentiate reservoir management units with similar 4D results but actually behaving differently in terms of production.”
CoViz 4D depicts production data as dynamic towers (red, green, blue). Upper and lower thresholds can be set with alert flags indicating under- and over-performance. Data used by permission of the owner.
Collaborative Understanding of Fluid Movement
Visualizing the dynamics of injection and production regimes in the context of other 3D and 4D data provides a much clearer understanding of the movement of fluids. It clearly highlights potential transmissibility barriers and impediments which result in unexpected decreased production rates.
Visualization has considerable benefit in any scenario where production data needs to be evaluated alongside relevant subsurface data including tracer data and CO2 movement in CCUS (Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage) programs. Visualizing CO2 injection rates and monitoring values post-storage are far better communicated through an interactive, collaborative platform that combines production data with other subsurface data to assess any leakage and inform decision making.
Visualizing CO2 injection rates and monitoring values post-storage are far better communicated through an interactive, collaborative platform that combines production data with other subsurface data to assess any leakage and inform decision making.
CoViz 4D Excels in Evaluating Oil and Gas Production Data in the Context of Changing Reservoir Conditions
CoViz 4D is unique in its ability to integrate the widest range of subsurface data, including volumes of oil and gas production data, to visualize the data in a collaborative 3D environment, as well as animate data over time (4D) to show how development decisions and changing reservoir conditions impact production. These CoViz 4D capabilities give reservoir teams an unprecedented understanding of how development decisions impact production throughout a reservoir’s life.
CoViz 4D, a data visualization analytics software from Dynamic Graphics, Inc., is used by oil and gas professionals worldwide to integrate relevant reservoir data. Powerful visualization capabilities enable development teams to explore data relationships, calculate and show inferred data, and analyze how development decisions impact production over time. To learn more about CoViz 4D contact our team.
