Integration of Pulsed Neutron Log Data: A Cost Saving-Value Driven Approach for Justification of Well Intervention

Abstract

The ability to perform remedial activities to enhance production from existing wells in order to extend field life is an essential component of brown field management. Predicting the movement of hydrocarbon/water behind casing and estimating remaining hydrocarbon column ensures economic value on proposed activities can be quantified. Fluid contact measurements over time are useful for tracking reservoir performance, planning work over and enhanced recovery strategies, as well as diagnosing production problems such as water influx. This paper highlights the value of integrating pulsed neutron log data with other subsurface data and models to provide a robust solution in well intervention. The case study demonstrates how pulsed neutron log data has helped resolve multiple challenges such as; Estimation of remaining hydrocarbon column and volume, perforation placement uncertainty, optimizing reservoir block development strategy and ensure robustness of reservoir dynamic models. Results from the case study show that integrating pulsed neutron log data in a work-over intervention could amount to huge cost savings (>$10,000,000 dollars in this case) in proposed operation. Additionally, calibration of acquired log data with existing dynamic models led to perforation optimization which gave resource volume increase of about 15% from two reservoirs against pre-estimated volume.