Production Logging Tool

• Submitted to:
DR.ABDULAZIZ M. ABDULAZIZ

• Submitted by:
Mohammed Abo El-Hamd El-Morsy
 Production Logging Tool

Production Logging is one of a number of cased hole services that includes cement monitoring,
corrosion monitoring, monitoring of formation fluid contacts (and saturations), perforating and
plug and packer setting. Services performed in dead, overbalanced, conditions can use
relatively simple surface pressure control equipment and are often performed using large open
hole style logging cables. With a well that has pressure at surface it is normal to use a small
logging cable in order to:
1. Minimize the tool weight needed to overcome the well pressure trying to extrude the cable.
2. Minimize the grease injection requirements to seal around a wireline cable.
Wells with surface pressure typically have a completion tubing of relatively small internal
diameter. ID, compared to the casing size across the reservoir. This reduced ID means that
cased hole tool-strings for live wells are typically sized at 1-11/16" in order to pass through the
smallest nipple in a 2-3/8" tubing. It is usual for cased hole equipment manufacturers to
produce a platform of sensors with common power supplies, telemetry (or memory) to cover
production logging, saturation logging, and multi-finger caliper corrosion logging.

- Application of production logs

Production logs are used to allocate production on a zone-by-zone basis and to diagnose
production problems such as leaks or cross flow. These various tasks can be split between those
where the target production is into or out of the well and those where the flow never enters
the well, typically flow behind pipe. The former is usually easier and quantitative while the
latter is qualitative.

- Fundamentals of production logging

Ideally we would like to measure radial inflow rates using a cheap and accurate sensor.
Unfortunately, no such sensor exists. Alternatively we could measure the axial flow rate in a
well at a depths above and below the zone of interest and compute the difference and hence
the inflow rate.
Unfortunately, there is not any practical measurement of axial flow rate beyond some special
applications of oxygen activation logs. However, it is possible to measure an axial velocity and
combine this with an assumed or measured internal diameter to arrive at an axial flow rate.
This last approach is most commonly used. Common velocity sensors include;
1. Turbine/Spinner flowmeters.
2. Markers/Tracers such as oxygen activation logs or radioactive iodine tracer logs.
3. Heated anenometry
Turbines or Spinners are assumed to rotate at a speed proportional to the average fluid velocity
passing through the swept area of the blades with an offset for friction/imperfections. This
becomes a simple gain and offset transformation from the rotational speed of the spinner.
Unfortunately, the gain and offset are not constants but are a complicated function of fluid
density, fluid viscosity, spinner pitch, pipe diameter, fluid velocity, etc. This means that the
spinner is typically calibrated downhole by recording the spinner speed at a series of different
logging speeds (usually 30, 60,90 ft/min or 10, 20, 30 m/min) and plotting the resultant average
spinner speed versus the corresponding average logging speed to determine the slope (gain)
and threshold (offset). The calibrated spinner velocity then needs to be converted to an
average pipe velocity.The correction coefficient determined by the velocity profile across the
pipe cross section can vary from 0.5 for an infinitely small spinner in laminar flow to 1.0 for a
spinner that sweeps the entire pipe area. N.B. The prefix "full bore" when applied to a spinner
is a marketing name. Full-bore spinners rarely cover more than half the pipe cross section. If the
cross sectional area of the spinner at the depth of the spinner blades occupies a significant
fraction of the pipe area then the pipe area should be reduced before multiplying it by the
spinner velocity and the correction coefficient.

- Categories of applications
Production-logging tools find many applications from the time a well is drilled until
abandonment and, occasionally, beyond [1]. An appropriate categorization of production logs is
by usage. This approach leads to the five distinct categories listed below that also represent a
rough chronological order of tool evolution. Effective interpretation of the data from each type
of log requires significant education and experience.
1. Diagnose production problems and allocate production
2. Monitor cement placement
3. Monitor corrosion
4. Monitor reservoir fluid contacts
5. Select zones for recompletion
Category one
Includes tools used to track movement of fluid either inside or immediately outside the casing
of a well. The logs frequently used for such flow diagnosis and allocation include:
Temperature surveys
Mechanical flowmeter surveys
Borehole fluid-density or fluid-capacitance surveys
Each of these tools responds to fluid velocity or fluid type. The logs are run to determine if a
production problem, such as excessive water or gas production, is the result of a completion
problem or a reservoir problem. Their value thus resides in the guidance they give for
continued expenditure on a well that is performing poorly. This type of application is largely
responsible for the growth and evolution of modern production logging. Also belonging in
Category One are:
Evaluations of the placement of acids or hydraulic-fracturing material
Diagnoses of premature flow or lost circulation in a drilling well
Category two
There are two different objectives of cement-placement monitoring:
To determine where the cement went (cement top)
To determine whether the cement provides zonal isolation
The logs used to locate the cement top include:
Temperature log, which responds to hydration heating
Unfocused gamma ray log, which responds to behind-pipe density
Regular bond log, which measures the acoustical deadening of pipe
Category three
Zonal isolation should be addressed when pressure imbalance causes cross flow through poorly
cemented sections, leading to excessive production of unwanted fluids. The tools most often
used for this purpose include:
Cement-bond logs
Temperature
Noise
Radioactive tracer
Neutron-activation logs
The temperature log detects alterations caused by flow, the noise log measures turbulent
sound caused by flow, and the tracer log tracks tagged fluid behind casing. The neutron-
activation log creates tracer in behind-pipe water.
Corrosion-monitoring tools are specialized in nature and include mechanical caliper tools and
electromagnetic casing-inspection tools. The mechanical caliper tools are used to assess
corrosion internal to the casing and to measure the shape of casing as well as the amount of
rod and drill pipe wear inside tubing or casing. The electromagnetic devices respond to changes
in metal thickness either inside or outside the pipe containing the tool. These logging tools are
either of the eddy-current type or of the flux-leakage type, or a combination of the two. The
eddy-current devices measure the load on a coil resulting from eddy currents induced into the
wall of the casing. This load increases with increases in wall thickness. The driven frequency of
the coil determines the depth of penetration of the field into the casing wall. The flux-leakage
devices measure, by means of pad-conveyed coils in contact with the pipe wall, the induced
currents that result from magnetic field lines that escape at abrupt changes in metal-wall
thickness. Both types of tools make indirect measurements that are then related to metal loss
through calibration.

Categories four and five

The last two categories, monitoring of fluid contacts in formations and selection of
recompletion
zones, use the cased-hole nuclear logs such as:
Neutron
Pulsed-neutron
- Production logging tools
Temperature logging
Radioactive tracer logging
Noise logging
Focused gamma ray density logging
Unfocused gamma ray density logging
Fluid capacitance logging
Fluid identification logging in high angle wells[2]
Continuous and full-bore spinner flowmeters
Diverting spinner flowmeter
- Production logging applications
Much emphasis is placed on the importance of using suites of production logs, rather than
relying on a single log. There is previous indication of the applicability of production logs at
various stages of a well’s life, from drilling to abandonment, and even beyond. Four examples
show how a suite of production logging tools can provide important diagnostic information at
different points in a well's life-cycle:
Production logs to assess gas kick
Profiling commingled gas production
Profiling oil production under WAG recovery
Gas blowout after abandonment
A set of production logging application tables are available to assist in selection of the
appropriate tools for different types of problems.