Numerical modeling and simulation of drilling cutting transport in horizontal wells

Zakerian, Ali; Sarafraz, Siyamak; Tabzar, Amir; Hemmati, Nassim; Shadizadeh, Seyed Reza

doi:10.1007/s13202-018-0435-6

Cited by 32 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 25 publications

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“…The heavier cuttings tend to settle to the wellbore bottom, as illustrated in Figure 12. The obtained results are confirmed by Li and Wilde 54 and Zakerian et al 55 The authors pointed out that a particle with a higher density is harder to transport through a wellbore. The reason behind that is the gravitational force increase when the density of cuttings particles increases (Figure 9 and Equation 3.2).…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 72%

Numerical study of cuttings transport of nanoparticle‐based drilling fluid

Al‐Yasiri

Al‐Gailani

Wen

2020

Engineering Reports

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Cuttings transportation from the drill bit, through the annulus, to the surface is one of the most important functions performed by drilling fluid. The prediction of drilling fluid's performance to transport cuttings in the annulus is very complex task due to the presence of numerous parameters. Nanoparticles (NPs) have been recently introduced into drilling fluid to engineer its properties and enhance its performance. Nevertheless, the lifting capacity has not been sufficiently investigated. The understanding of the influence and the mechanisms responsible for the improvement in cuttings transport process can further advance the application of NPs for drilling fluids. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) is widely used as a numerical technique in handling complex multiphase flow problems in different operational conditions. The present work has taken the advantages of CFD to computationally analyze the influence of NPs and the effects of various parameters such as drilling fluids rheology, flow rate, pipe rotation, cuttings density, shape, concentration, and drilling fluids-cuttings particle coupling regimes on the cuttings transport in a vertical wellbore. The CFD simulation is carried out by using transient solver of ANSYS-FLUENT commercial code. The dense discrete phase model is used to overcome the main shortcomings of previous Eulerian based approaches. Good agreement has been achieved between the simulation and the published experimental results. It showed that the fluid viscosity and cuttings transport process can be significantly enhanced by adding nanomaterials to the fluid, and the process is highly influenced by cuttings characteristics such as in situ concentration, shape, and density. K E Y W O R D SCFD, cuttings transport, drilling fluids, multiphase flow, nanoparticles, rheology, wellbore Abbreviations: CFD, computational fluid dynamics; DDPM, dense discrete phase model; DEM, discrete element method; HTHP, high temperature and high pressure; LTLP, low temperature and low pressure

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Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 72%

Numerical study of cuttings transport of nanoparticle‐based drilling fluid

Al‐Yasiri

Al‐Gailani

Wen

2020

Engineering Reports

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“…Moreover, the fragment sizes and shapes have a dramatic influence on fragments transportation in WJD holes. The large coal fragments are difficult to discharge from the hole with water flow, resulting in sticking and serious friction resistance [19,20]. Therefore, it is very necessary to study the fragmentation size distribution characteristics of coal generated from WJD.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Investigation on Coal Fragmentation by High-Velocity Water Jet in Drilling: Size Distributions and Fractal Characteristics

Xiao

et al. 2018

Applied Sciences

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Water jet drilling (WJD) technology is a highly efficient method to extract coalbed methane from reservoirs with low permeability. It is crucial to efficiently remove the coal fragments while drilling. In this study, to disclose coal fragmentation features and size distributions under water jet impact in drilling, the image processing method was utilized to obtain the geometric dimensions of coal fragments. The size distributions, morphologies and fractal characteristics of coal fragmentation were studied based on generalized extreme value distribution and fractal theory. The effects of the jet impact velocity and coal strength on the fragmentation features were analyzed. The results show that fine particles dominate the coal fragments in WJD for coal seams with various strengths. In experiments conducted at the Fengchun coal mine, owing to the higher coal strength of the M7 coal seam, the fragmentation degree of coal subjected to water jets during WJD is lower in the M7 coal steam than in the M8 coal seam, which results in a large dominant fragment size and small fractal dimension under the same impact energy. It was found that the higher the jet impact velocity is, the higher the quantity of fragments generated from WJD and the smaller the particle size. The NUM-based cumulative probability distribution curves of coal fragments are more intensive in the range of relatively small particle sizes and then become sparser with the increase in particle size. When the impact velocity increases, (i) the size distribution curves move toward smaller particle sizes, and the dominant fragment size decreases; (ii) the shape (major axis/minor axis) of coal fragments move toward the upper left, and the curve shape for a high impact velocity attains unity more quickly; and (iii) the fractal dimension value increases linearly. In addition, the fractal dimensions are obviously affected by the dominant fragment size; they increase with the decrease in the dominant fragment size. This study can provide a basis for further research on coal fragment transportation in WJD and parameter selection for discharging coal fragments during drilling for CBM development.

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“…The development of heavy oil reservoirs with bottom water is one of the big challenges in the oil and gas exploitation field worldwide [1,2]. Developing reservoirs in these types, it often shows early water appearance, short water-free period, high water-cut ratio, and even violent water-cut ratio after water breakthrough, which reduces oil recovery and increases oilfield production risk [3,4].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Research on the Water Production Tracking Method of Horizontal Well in Heavy Oil Reservoir with Bottom Water

Pan¹,

Wang²,

Chenyang³

et al. 2022

Lithosphere

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At present, the model of heterogeneous fluid production in horizontal wells in bottom water reservoirs does not comprehensively consider the influence of parameters such as flow, length, and position of each production section, resulting in the distortion of interpretation results. Using the Green function and the Newman product method, this paper derives heterogeneous fluid production in horizontal wells in the bottom water heavy oil reservoir. The Stehfest numerical inversion algorithm was used to obtain the bottom fluid pressure solution of the horizontal well production in the bottom water heavy oil reservoir with the wellbore storage effect and skin effect. By drawing the typical chart of horizontal well test in sections, the new model can be divided into five typical flow stages: wellbore storage stage, transition stage, radial flow stage, linear flow stage, and late stable flow stage. Based on the interpretation of conventional parameters, such as permeability, well storage, and skin effect, the new model can further diagnose the parameters such as liquid production length, liquid production position, and liquid production volume of each horizontal section. The field application examples verify the validity of the research results and broad application prospects.

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Numerical modeling and simulation of drilling cutting transport in horizontal wells

Cited by 32 publications

References 25 publications

Numerical study of cuttings transport of nanoparticle‐based drilling fluid

Numerical study of cuttings transport of nanoparticle‐based drilling fluid

Investigation on Coal Fragmentation by High-Velocity Water Jet in Drilling: Size Distributions and Fractal Characteristics

Research on the Water Production Tracking Method of Horizontal Well in Heavy Oil Reservoir with Bottom Water

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