A Success Story in Managing and Optimising Gas Lift Wells in Matured Oil Field: Automated Workflows in Digital Fields as Enablers to Accelerate Opportunities Creation and Production Optimisation

Abstract

Field S located in offshore Malaysia had been producing for more than 30 years with nearly 90% of current active strings dependent on gas lift assistance. Subsurface challenges encountered in this matured field such as management of increasing water-cut, sand production, and depleting reservoir pressure are one of key factors that drive the asset team to continuously monitor the performance of gaslifted wells to ensure better control of production thereby meeting target deliverability of the field. Hence, Gas Lift Optimization (GLOP) campaign was embarked in Field S to accelerate short term production with integration of Gas Lift Management Modules in Integrated Operations (IO). A workflow was created to navigate asset team in this campaign from performing gaslift health check, diagnostic and troubleshooting to data and model validation until execution prior to identification of GLOP candidates with facilitation from digital workflows. Digital Fields and Integrated Operations (IO) developed in Field S provided an efficient collaborative working environment to monitor field performance real time and optimize production continuously. Digital Fields comprises of multiple engineering workflows developed and operationalized to act as enablers for the asset team to quickly identify the low-hanging fruit opportunities. This paper will focus on entire cycle process of digital workflows with engineer's intervention in data hygiene and model validation, the challenges to implement GLOP, and results from the campaign in Field S.