Precise Tiltmeter Subsidence Monitoring Enhances Reservoir Management

Davis, Eric J.; Wright, C. A.; Demetrius, S.L.; Choi, Jinyoung; Craley, G.

doi:10.2118/62577-ms

Cited by 31 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 18 publications

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“…In a similar way, changes in reservoir volumes, such as those produced by fluid production, injection, and thermal processes such as steam flooding, CSS, SAGD, and CCS, also generate unique and measurable patterns of deformation. These patterns, or deformation fields, can be measured at the earth's surface with instrumentation, such as tiltmeters, InSAR, and GPS (Davis et al 2000) Table 1. By solving a geophysical inverse problem, precisely measured surface deformation can be used to solve for reservoir-level strain changes.…”

Section: Recovery Surveillance Using Advanced Microdeformation Technomentioning

confidence: 99%

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Improving Reservoir Monitoring in EOR Environments Using Microdeformation-Based Technologies

et al. 2011

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Nearly every reservoir-level process generates and propagates outward a pattern of strain that can be detected using sensitive deformation-monitoring technologies. Microdeformation monitoring seeks to precisely detect and characterize strain patterns caused by fluid production and injection, thermal process such as steam flooding, cyclic steam stimulation (CSS), and steam-assisted gravity drainage (SAGD), as well as CO 2 Sequestration (CCS). By solving a geophysical inverse problem, well-characterized strain measurements can be used to identify and illustrate reservoir-level changes on a wide variety of spatial and temporal scales. Bringing surface deformation measurements down to the reservoir level to obtain the fluid migration pathways, volumetric strain, pressure fronts, or thermal fronts allows operators and asset managers to improve their understanding of how different storage and recovery methods work in different types of reservoirs at significant cost savings compared to traditional monitoring technologies.A variety of independent yet complimentary technologies currently exist that allow a complete and accurate characterization of ground deformation patterns required to geomechanically invert for reservoir-level processes. Examples of recent work from California's thermal enhanced oil recovery (EOR) environments using tiltmeters, GPS, and interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) are highlighted and discussed, showing how the microdeformation process has been employed to improve production surveillance and project operations.

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Section: Recovery Surveillance Using Advanced Microdeformation Technomentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Tiltmeters are used to monitor reservoirs and map surface subsidence (Davis et al 2000;McGillivray 2004;Du and Olson 2001;Vasco et al 1998). Tiltmeters measure the rate of change in elevation, which is far easier to measure than the elevation itself.…”

Section: Surface Tiltmeter Monitoringmentioning

confidence: 99%

Improving Reservoir Monitoring in EOR Environments Using Microdeformation-Based Technologies

et al. 2011

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“…The tilt data provide key information on geological setting, fluid regime, coupling between pore fluid and soil matrix as well as subsidence. Thus, these tiltmeter surveys are commonly conducted in hydrocarbon or groundwater exploration and monitoring (Castillo et al, 1997;Davis et al, 2000;Vasco et al, 2002;Du et al, 2005). In contrast to methods such as optical instrument levelling surveys, global positioning system (GPS) surveys or satellite-related interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) techniques, which estimate areal surface deformations, tiltmeter surveys are not affected by plant cover, the instruments can be deployed so that they are protected from vandalism and continuous data acquisition is conducted at selected positions with a comparatively high resolution.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This study aims on tilt surveys with a duration of several days to weeks or a couple of months as conducted for hydrocarbon or groundwater related purposes (Davis et al, 2000(Davis et al, , 2001. Usually, 10 to 20 geodetic tiltmeters, e.g.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Poroelasticity: Finite element modelling of anomalous tilt and pore pressure caused by pumping in a sedimentary half space with fault

Urlaub

Fabian

2011

Journal of Geodynamics

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a b s t r a c tExtraction of groundwater or hydrocarbons causes pore pressure gradients and soil deformation due to poroelastic coupling. Recent studies show that high-resolution engineering tiltmeters installed at shallow depth between 2 and 10 m resolve this deformation. Models using poroelasticity can describe the relationship between fluid extraction, pore pressure gradients and induced tilt for homogeneous and layered sedimentary half spaces. Faults intersecting a stack of sedimentary layers, for example in the Lower-Rhine-Embayment, are of fundamental impact to the groundwater flow system of an area. However, the fault's hydromechanical effect on pump induced tilt and the pore pressure regime is still poorly investigated. We chose a comparatively simple approach to quantify anomalous pump induced tilt and pore pressure observed near a fault and close to the surface in a sedimentary subsoil. A PC-based Finite Element software is used to model poroelastic deformation, i.e. modelling vertical tilt and excess pore pressure in response to fluid extraction through a singular well. We compare numerical solutions for models with and without faults and show that a fault can modify symmetry and amplitude of the deformation field by more than a magnitude. We conclude that tilt and pore pressure measurements also at shallow depth can thus be biased by large subsurface structures like faults. Vice versa, these measurements may provide means to quantify hydromechanical effects caused by subsurface structures. However, depending on the geological setting, i.e. if pathways are established by a fault, the anomaly caused by the fault can also be small and hard to detect. Therefore, faults and geological structures like material boundaries have to be considered in poroelastic models carefully. For tilt surveys with a limited number of instruments in geologically well constrained areas these models allow the preselection of potential positions for tiltmeters where prominent field anomalies are expected.

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“…More recently, the process has been applied to a variety of long-term reservoir monitoring projects in which water or steam injection is tracked in an effort to determine the relative locations of reservoir dilation or compaction [9][10][11][12] .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A New Method for Vertical Leak Detection in Low to Moderate Permeability Flooded Reservoirs

Walser¹,

Stanley²,

Astakhov³

2008

All Days

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Rising commodity prices have resulted in an increase in secondary recovery projects that are associated with lower permeability reservoirs. These processes often inject fluids above the parting pressure for the duration of the life of the flood, and pressurization takes place as fluids leak off from the exposed surface area of the induced fracture into the surrounding moderate or low-permeability reservoir matrix. The primary difference between these situations and conventional flooding is that matrix fluid migration is initiating off an induced fracturing plane, as opposed to point-source initiation.During the early history of a flood, mass-balance issues are often ignored, as average reservoir pressures are typically low, and injection rates can dramatically exceed production. As pressures rise, some localized portions of the reservoir not only can exceed virgin static pressures, but volumes near existing induced fractures can approach or equal the pressure in those fractures. When this occurs, vertical fracturing can be initiated, either above or below the reservoir, depending upon the location of the closest lower stress interval.A new method to detect the location of vertical "leakage" has been developed. This method utilizes existing Surface Tiltmeter (STM) technologies and a new surface deformation calculation regime to zero in on volumetric changes that occur above or below the limits of the given reservoir. This method uses measured surface deformation from observed tilt to extrapolate the volumetric change at different specified depths. With a number of constraints, and using a linear geophysical model based on poroelastic equations, an inversion routine is used to find the reservoir compaction or expansion at different depths. When volumetric change best fits the measured deformation data (or tilt) at the surface, the depth and aerial location is then correlated to the area near a specific well or wells.

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Precise Tiltmeter Subsidence Monitoring Enhances Reservoir Management

Cited by 31 publications

References 18 publications

Improving Reservoir Monitoring in EOR Environments Using Microdeformation-Based Technologies

Improving Reservoir Monitoring in EOR Environments Using Microdeformation-Based Technologies

Poroelasticity: Finite element modelling of anomalous tilt and pore pressure caused by pumping in a sedimentary half space with fault

A New Method for Vertical Leak Detection in Low to Moderate Permeability Flooded Reservoirs

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