SPE-195799-MS

Steam Conformance along Horizontal Well with Different Well

Configurations: An Experimental and Numerical Investigation

Xiaohu Dong, Huiqing Liu, and Ning Lu, China University of Petroleum, Beijing; Aiping Zheng, Xinjiang Oilfield
Company, CNPC; Keliu Wu, China University of Petroleum, Beijing; Qianhua Xiao, Chongqing University of
Science & Technology; Kung Wang and Zhangxin Chen, University of Calgary

Copyright 2019, Society of Petroleum Engineers

This paper was prepared for presentation at the SPE Annual Technical Conference and Exhibition held in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, 30 Sep - 2 October 2019.

This paper was selected for presentation by an SPE program committee following review of information contained in an abstract submitted by the author(s). Contents
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Abstract
Considering the non-uniform steam conformance of conventional horizontal well, dual-pipe steam injection
technique has currently demonstrated technical potential for improving heavy oil recovery. It can delay the
occurrence of steam fingering and homogenize the steam injection profile along horizontal wellbore. But in
some field tests, it is observed that the results were far greater than such an approach would have justified. In
addition, the actual physics are still unclear, and not demonstrated. In this paper, first, we built a cylindrical
wellbore physical model to experimentally study steam injection profiles of a single pipe horizontal well and
a concentric dual-pipe horizontal well. Thus, the heat and mass transfer behavior of steam along horizontal
well with a single-pipe well configuration and a dual-pipe well configuration was addressed. Subsequently,
considering the effect of pressure drops and heat loss, a semi-analytical model for the gas-liquid two-phase
flow in horizontal wellbore was developed to numerically match the experimental observation. Next, a
sensitivity analysis on the physical parameters and operation properties of a steam injection process was
conducted. The effect of the injection fluid type was also investigated.
Experimental results indicated that under the same steam injection condition, an application of the dual-
pipe well configuration can significantly enhance the oil drainage volume by about 35% than the single-pipe
well configuration. During the experiments, both a temperature distribution and liquid production along the
horizontal wellbore were obtained. A bimodal temperature distribution can be observed for the dual-pipe
well configuration. From this proposed model, an excellent agreement can be found between the simulation
results and the experimental data. Because of the effect of variable-mass flowing behavior and pressure
drops, the wellbore segment closed to the steam outflow point can have a higher heating radius than that far
from the steam outflow point. From the results of sensitivity analysis, permeability heterogeneity and steam
injection parameters have a tremendous impact on the steam injection profile along wellbore. Compared
with a pure steam injection process, the co-injection of steam and NCG (non-condensable gas) can improve
the effective heating wellbore length by over 25%. Furthermore, this model is also applied to predict the
steam conformance of an actual horizontal well in Liaohe oilfield. This paper presents some information
regarding the heat and mass transfer of a dual-pipe horizontal well, as well as imparts some of the lessons
2 SPE-195799-MS

learned from its field operation. It plays an important role for the performance evaluation and remaining
reserve prediction in a dual-pipe thermal recovery project.

Introduction
A horizontal well-based steam injection technique has become an important EOR method for heavy oil and
oilsands reservoirs (Chen et al., 2006). During a steam injection process using horizontal well, the selection
of a well completion method is an important part to guarantee the success of steam injection operation.
In recent years, a dual-pipe steam injection technique has demonstrated technical potential for improving
the heavy oil recovery. The commonly-used dual-pipe well configurations include parallel dual-pipe and
concentric dual-pipe (Dong et al., 2019a). For these two pipes in horizontal wellbore, both of them can
be used for steam injection or oil production. In some projects, one pipe is used for steam injection and
the other one is used for oil production. Compared with the conventional single pipe well configuration,
dual pipes provide a more uniform steam conformance along the horizontal wellbore. Currently, these
two types of dual-pipe well configurations have been widely applied for thermal recovery processes in
Xinjiang, Shengli and Liaohe oilfields, China (Zhang and Zhao 2007; Liu 2013; Dong et al., 2014). For a
SAGD process in oilsands reservoirs, the application of dual-pipe well configuration can also facilitate the
preheating operation (Stone et al., 2014). In addition, a parallel well configuration strategy has been also
applied in the SAGD field tests in Western Canada (Saltuklaroglu et al., 2000; Li et al., 2011; Stone et al.,
2014). For parallel dual pipes, considering the limitation of pipe size, they are mainly used for a shallow
heavy oil reservoir, such as the operation in Cold Lake (385m) in Canada and Chong 32 block (<200m) in
Xinjiang oilfield, China (Arthur et al., 1993). Comparatively, a concentric dual-pipe well configuration can
be applied in a deeper reservoir, such as the operation in Shengli and Liaohe oilfields (Dong et al., 2019a).
Furthermore, for some significantly heterogeneous heavy oil reservoirs, a multi-pipe well configuration has
been also proposed and operated to improve the recovery performance (Castrup 2001).
For the steam injection operation using a horizontal well, to effectively evaluate the fluid flow behavior
along horizontal wellbore is the most important step for the prediction of productivity of the horizontal well.
The flowing characteristics of steam injected in horizontal completion intervals are not only influenced by
the fluid outflow, but also by the heat transmission between wellbore and a reservoir. The changes of phase
state for steam injected caused by the heat loss of wellbore should be also considered (Gui et al., 2006; Izgec
et al., 2007; Gao and Jalali 2008). Wu et al. (2004) introduced the concepts of staggered grids and equivalent
permeability. The flow process of fluids in horizontal wellbore is equivalent to the seepage in porous media.
Thus, an equivalent flow model of horizontal wellbore is proposed. But, considering the ideal assumption
of this model, it has limited applications. Wu et al. (2012) established the flow model of steam in horizontal
wellbore with a parallel string. In this model, the influence of steam injection method was considered.
Thus, the steam flow rate along the horizontal wellbore was derived. Xi et al. (2009) introduced the concept
of multi-segment well and combined the flow in a reservoir and wellbore. Then, the maximum allowable
length of thermal horizontal well was proposed. Using the microelement analysis method, Chen et al. (2007)
established the steam outflow model of thermal horizontal well in heavy oil reservoirs. Considering the
influence of gravity drainage, Wu et al. (2011) studied the performance characteristics of horizontal well
in heavy oil reservoirs. Thus, the flow characteristics, production characteristics and inflow performance
of a thermal horizontal well were derived.
Fig. 1 shows the temperature distribution of a typical horizontal well along the horizontal wellbore
with the conventional steam injection method from Liaohe oilfield (Dong et al. 2014). As shown, for this
horizontal well, only the horizontal wellbore segments closed to the steam outflow points can be effectively
heated. For the horizontal interval far from the steam outflow points, the steam injected is not reached. From
Fig. 1, it is also observed that as the CSS (cyclic steam stimulation) cycles increases, the difference between
SPE-195799-MS 3

the heel-end section and the toe-end section is enhanced gradually. At the end of the 5th CSS cycle, the
temperature difference between the heel-end section and the toe-end section even reached about 140°C.

Figure 1—Temperature distribution along horizontal wellbore of a typical well from Du84 block in Liaohe oilfield.

Fig. 2 presents the steam injection profiles of 3 typical steam injection horizontal wells from Xinjiang
oilfield. As shown, Fig. 2(a) shows the test results of a horizontal well with the heel-end well completion
mode. Fig. 2(b) indicates the test results of a horizontal well with the toe-end well completion mode. We can
see that Fig. 2(a) and Fig. 2(b) are the typical horizontal wells of “heel-good, toe-bad” and “toe-good and
heel-bad”. The performance of a thermal horizontal well is significantly related to the wellbore configuration
(single-pipe or dual-pipe). Considering the non-uniform steam conformance along horizontal wellbore, a
parallel dual-pipe well configuration is applied in Xinjiang oilfield. Fig. 3 shows the temperature distribution
of a typical horizontal well with the parallel dual-pipe well configuration in Xinjiang oilfield. As shown,
compared with the performance of the wells in Figs. 2(a) and 2(b), the steam conformance of this well is
significantly improved. A dual-pipe well configuration is technically feasible and has been widely applied
in fields to improve the steam conformance of a horizontal well. For the behavior of heat and mass transfer
of hot fluids along horizontal wellbore, there have been limited studies in the literature (Xiong et al., 2016;
Dong et al., 2019a). Although it has been applied in field tests, it is observed that the results were far greater
than such an approach would have justified. More importantly, the actual physics are still unclear and not
demonstrated.

Figure 2—Temperature distribution of single-pipe well configuration of typical

wells in Xinjiang oilfield. (a) heel-good and toe-bad; (b) toe-good and heel-bad.
4 SPE-195799-MS

Figure 3—Temperature distribution of parallel dual-pipe well configuration of typical wells in Xinjiang oilfield.

In this paper, a cylindrical wellbore physical model is first developed to experimentally study the steam
injection profile of a horizontal well with different configurations. Then, using this model, we, respectively,
discussed the heat and mass transfer behavior of hot fluids within a single-pipe well configuration and a
dual-pipe well configuration. Subsequently, considering the effect of pressure drops and heat loss, a semi-
analytical model for the gas-liquid two-phase flow in horizontal wellbore was developed to numerically
match the experimental observation. Furthermore, a sensitivity analysis on the physical parameters and
operation parameters was conducted. The effect of hot fluid type was also investigated.

Experimental setup
In this paper, a cylindrical wellbore physical model is proposed firstly, as shown in Fig. 4. The length of
the wellbore model is 80cm. There are 70 temperature measuring points and 10 pressure measuring points
along the wellbore. Meanwhile, in order to measure the liquid production profile along the wellbore, 12
outlets are also designed. Using this model, the steam conformance along the wellbore with different well
configurations can be discussed. For dual-pipe well configuration, the hot fluids, including pure saturated
steam and steam-additive mixtures, can be simultaneously injected from the two pipes. In this study, based
on this model, the steam conformance of both the single pipe well configuration and concentric pipe well
configuration are experimentally investigated. The schematic of the experimental setup is shown in Fig. 4.
Using this model, the full CSS processes using the single pipe and concentric dual-pipe well configurations
are experimentally investigated. Based on the pressure, temperature and oil production rate monitoring
results during CSS process, the steam conformance of different well configurations can be obtained.

Figure 4—The schematic of experimental setup.

SPE-195799-MS 5

During experiments, the oil sample we used is the dead oil (2200mPa.s@SC) from Henan oilfield,
SINOPEC. The water is distilled water. The quartz sand with 80-100 mesh is used to simulate the porous
media. Thus, from the experimental model, the effect of steam injection method and steam injection pipe
configuration can be discussed. Furthermore, changing the mesh of quartz sand, the effect of permeability
heterogeneity can be also investigated.
The experimental procedures are as follows: (1) sand filling to simulate the permeability condition; (2)
connect the experimental apparatuses to check out the gas tightness; (3) water injection to test the pore
volume and porosity; (4) oil injection to establish the original oil saturation condition; (5) steam injection
to simulate the CSS process. (6) data monitoring for the distribution of pressure, temperature and liquid
production along the wellbore. More details about this experiment can be also found in one of our recent
publications (Dong et al. 2019b).

Experimental results
Fig. 5 shows the distribution of temperature and pressure of three different well configurations after soaking.
During experiments, the total steam injection volumes for the three cases are the same (10mL/min*30min).
For single pipe well configuration, there includes methods of heel-end injection and toe-end injection. For
the operation of concentric dual-pipe experiment, the steam injection rates of long pipe and short pipe are one
half of the steam injection rate of single pipe well configuration. As shown, for all the three experiments, the
temperature around the steam outflow points is always higher. And the steam will preferentially enter into
the reservoir at the wellbore interval where closed to the steam outflow points. For heel-end injection mode,
the temperature around the heel-end section is much higher. For dual-pipe well configuration, both the heel-
end section and toe-end section have a higher temperature. Compared with single pipe well configuration, a
bimodal temperature distribution can be observed for the dual-pipe one. The results of pressure distribution
also have the similar observation. On the other hand, from the results in Fig. 5(a), it can be also observed
that the dual-pipe well configuration can significantly enhance the heating volume (oil drainage volume)
by about 35% than the single-pipe well configuration.

Figure 5—Temperature and pressure data after steam injection. (a) Temperature; (b) Pressure.

Fig. 6 gives the results of cumulative oil production along the horizontal wellbore in the CSS cycle.
As shown, the oil production data is similar with the temperature and pressure results in Fig. 5, and
a bimodal distribution can be observed. We can see that the total oil production outcomes of the three
experiments are 52.2 mL (heel-end), 56.3 mL (toe-end) and 54.9 mL (dual-pipe) respectively. And the total
oil production does not change significantly. But the effective wellbore interval is much different. Using
the concentric dual-pipe well configuration can significantly improve the steam conformance along the
horizontal wellbore. It is consistent with the filed test, as shown in Fig. 2 & 3. The effective producing
wellbore interval is always closed to the steam outflow segment.
6 SPE-195799-MS

Figure 6—Oil production data.

From the experimental results, we can see that compared with the single-pipe configuration, the dual-
pipe configuration is more effective to improve the steam conformance along the horizontal well. For the
horizontal well with dual-pipe configuration, both the reservoirs around the heel-end section and toe-end
section can be effectively unlocked. And from the steam outflow points (heel-end or toe-end) to the wellbore
middle section, the temperature profile and oil production rate is decreasing gradually.

Mathematical model
In this section, considering the effect of pressure drops and heat loss, a semi-analytical model for the
gas-liquid two-phase flow in horizontal wellbore is developed. Therefore, based on this model, the steam
conformance of single pipe and dual pipe horizontal wells can be studied. A schematic for the heating
effect of concentric dual-pipe well configuration is shown in Fig. 7. As shown, for a dual-pipe well
configuration, the dumbbell-shaped heating effect can be observed, especially for the horizontal well with
a long wellbore length. The effect of pressure drops along horizontal wellbore on the steam conformance
is more significant. The assumptions of this model are as follows: (1) During steam injection process, the
steam injection parameters (e.g., injection rate, steam pressure and steam quality) at the tube outlet-end
remain unchanged; (2) The changes of reservoir properties caused by the changes of reservoir temperature
and pressure are neglected; (3) The perforation parameters remain the same along the horizontal wellbore,
including perforation density, phase angle and perforation hole size.

Figure 7—Schematic of steam injection process using concentric well configuration.

Governing equations
Along the horizontal wellbore, the horizontal well is firstly subdivided. The structure diagram of micro
control element is shown in Fig. 8. Thus, the corresponding governing equations of wellbore micro control
element are developed, as shown below.
SPE-195799-MS 7

Figure 8—The micro control element of horizontal interval.

Mass conservation law. The mass conservation equation of wellbore micro control element is shown in
Eq. (1).
(1)
Where, A is the cross-sectional area, qmi is the steam injection rate of wellbore micro control element.
(2)
Where, Pi is the steam injection pressure of micro control element; Pe is the reservoir pressure; Ji is the
fluid production index (Chen et al. 2007; Dong et al., 2013).

(3)

Ii in Eq. (2) is the fluid outflow index.

(4)

Where, Ai is the drainage area of wellbore micro control element i; rw is the wellbore radius; Eh is a
constant of thermal effect, it considers the relationship between steam chamber and cap rock.

(5)

Where, tD is the non-dimensional time, tCD is the critical time of steam front moving, hD is the non-
dimensional enthalpy.

(6)

Where, MR is the specific heat capacity of reservoir.

(7)
Momentum conservation law. The momentum conservation equation of wellbore micro control element
is shown below.
(8)
8 SPE-195799-MS

Where, vr is the flow rate of steam in perforated holes; τf is the frictional force of wellbore micro control
element.

(9)

Energy conservation law. The energy changes of horizontal wellbore micro control element include the
mass changes of saturated steam, radial heat transmission and friction loss etc. Furthermore, the enthalpy
changes and kinetic loss caused by the steam injection process through perforated holes should be also taken
into account. Thus, the energy conservation equation of wellbore micro control element can be obtained.

(10)

(11)

(12)

(13)

Auxiliary equations
Friction resistance factor of gas-liquid two-phase flow. The frequently-used methods for the friction
resistance factor of gas-liquid two-phase flow include experimental method, correlation and Moody figure
(Asheim et al., 1992; Bo and Wu 2004). In this section, a correlation method is applied. From Beggs-
Brill’s model, the friction resistance factor of gas-liquid two-phase flow (fmain), is the function of Reynolds
number and roughness of tube wall. Here, the influence of gas-liquid flow pattern in horizontal wellbore
is considered.
Reynolds number of gas-liquid two-phase flow is.

(14)

Where, El is the liquid holdup.

Thus, the frictional resistance factor can be determined.

(15)

Where, Δ is the relative roughness of tube wall.

(16)
Using the method of physical simulation, Su and Gudmundsson (1994, 1998) investigated the frictional
resistance factor of perforated holes, fperf, as shown below.

(17)

(18)
SPE-195799-MS 9

(19)

Thus the total friction resistance coefficient (ft) could be determined, as shown in the following equation.
(20)
Heat flux rate. The heat transmission of horizontal completion interval is different from the heat
transmission of unperforated interval. The radial heat flux rate of perforated interval refers to the heat
transmission from wellbore to reservoir. The heat transmission from horizontal wellbore to cement ring is
a steady-state process, thus the total capacity of heat transmission of wellbore micro control element from
casing pipe to cement ring is,
(21)
Where, U is the heat transfer coefficient.

(22)

The heat transmission from cement ring to formation is an unsteady state process, thus we have.

(23)

Where, f(t) is the non-dimensional heat transmission time function, the revised Ramey’s model is used
(Hasan and Kabir 1991).

(24)

Where, τD is the non-dimensional time.

(25)
During the steam injection process, steam is continuously injected into the reservoir. The heating area is
expanded, and the heating radius is increased. Thus the radial heat transmission of steam should take the
changes of heating radius into account, and the radius in Eq. (25) should be corrected. According to the
Marx-Langenheim model, the heating radius of reservoir is.

(26)

When the heat loss of cap rock is ignored, we could obtain.

(27)

Where, is is the injection rate; Kob is the thermal conductivity of cap rock; M is the Heat capacity of
reservoir; t is the injection time.
Flow model in reservoir. Saturated steam is a slightly compressible fluid. After it is injected into the
reservoir, the reservoir pressure will be changed gradually. During the steam injection process, the unsteady
flow equation in reservoir could be described in the following equation (Jones 1992; Liu et al., 2007).

(28)
10 SPE-195799-MS

Where, qmv is the fluid volume outflow rate; ks is the effective permeability of steam, it generally equals
to a quarter of the reservoir permeability.
Constraint equation of steam flow rate. The mass rate of steam during the injection process remains
unchanged.

(29)

The mass rate of steam in main horizontal wellbore is,

(30)

Simulation procedures
Using microelement analysis method and iteration method, the heat transfer behavior and pressure drops of
gas-liquid two phase flow in perforated horizontal wellbore are simulated. The length of each micro control
element is Δl. It is assumed that the pressure-drop of micro control element is Δp, and the quality-drop of
steam is Δx. For heel-end well completion mode, the simulation procedure is started from the heel-end of
horizontal wellbore. The simulation flowchart is shown in Fig. 9.

Figure 9—Calculation flowchart for this mathematical model.

SPE-195799-MS 11

Simulation results
Model validation
Lab scale simulation. Based on above mathematical model and simulation algorithm, the flowing behavior
of hot fluids along the horizontal wellbore can be simulated. In this section, a lab scale simulation is
performed firstly. The basic data is shown in Table 1. Thus the simulation results can be compared against
the experimental data in section 3 to confirm the accuracy of this model. The comparison results are
shown in Fig. 10. As shown, an excellent agreement can be found between the simulation results and
experimental data. This model can be used to effectively evaluate the performance of different horizontal
well configurations.

Table 1—Basic data used to validate the model

Parameters value Parameters value

Wellbore length / cm 80 Porosity / % 0.38

Wellbore radius / cm 6 Oil viscosity / mPa.s@S.C.* 2200
Radius of perforation hole / cm 3 Steam injection rate / mL/min 40
Perforation density / m -1 250 Steam injection time / min 30
Surface temperature / °C 25 Thermal conductivity of wellbore model / W/(m.°C) 53
Steam temperature / °C 130 Thermal conductivity of reservoir/ W/(m.°C) 2.745
Reservoir permeability / 10-3μm2 3000 Thermal diffusion coefficient / (m2/h) 0.7×10-6

*S.C. refers to surface condition.

Figure 10—Comparison between the experimental data and simulated results. (a) Pressure; (b) Temperature.

Field scale simulation. On the other hand, based on the data in Table 2, the solution of our model is also
compared against the field scale simulation results from commercial thermal simulator, CMG®. The well
configuration is heel-end mode. The results are shown in Fig. 11. For the results of CMG simulator, it is
observed that the whole reservoir along the horizontal interval can be effectively heated. But in field, only
the segments closed to the heel-end section can be effectively heated. Our simulation results present that
only the first part of horizontal interval is heated. And the pressure and heating radius within this part are
in good agreement with results of CMG®. Here, a concept of effective heat length of horizontal well is
introduced to evaluate the heating effect of steam injection process along horizontal wellbore, as shown in
Fig. 11(b). The results also present the physical parameters of steam injected along the horizontal interval
are changed nonlinearly. That is because that our model considers the influence of phase change and flow-
12 SPE-195799-MS

pattern characteristics of gas-liquid two phase flow along the horizontal wellbore. Our results show that
the variable-mass flow process of saturated steam along the horizontal interval present three flow patterns,
including intermittent flow (0∼78m), transition flow (78∼161m) and separation flow (161∼187m).

Table 2—Basic data of horizontal wellbore

Parameters Value Parameters Value

Reservoir depth / m 500 Injection pressure / MPa 5.0

Length of horizontal well / m 300 Steam quality / decimal 0.7
Inner radius of case / m 0.0885 Injection rate / t/d 144
Outer radius of case / m 0.1250 Cement radius / m 0.12
Inner radius of tube / m 0.03800 Oil viscosity @R.C.* / cp 5000
Outer radius of tube / m 0.04445 Reservoir pressure / MPa 4.8
Perforation density / m -1 5 Thermal diffusivity of formation / m /h
2 0.7×10-6
Surface temperature / °C 22 Thermal conductivity 45.7
/ W.(m.K)-1
case and tube
Temperature gradient/ °C/m-1 0.032 cement ring 0.350
Injection time / d 5 formation 1.73

*R.C. refers to reservoir condition.

Figure 11—The results of our model and CMG thermal simulator. (a) Pressure; (b) Heating radius.

General behavior of different well configurations

Based on the data in Table 2, the steam injection profile along horizontal well with different well
configurations is simulated. The results are shown in Fig. 12. We can see that the field scale simulation
results are in consistent with the lab scale results in Fig. 10. For heel-end and toe-end methods, only the
reservoirs around the heel-end section and toe-end section can be unlocked. Because the cross area of
annulus space is smaller than that of the injection tubing, the friction loss of toe-end method is higher.
Therefore, for toe-end well configuration, under a same condition, the change of steam quality along
horizontal well is more significant, and the effective heating length is also slightly shorter. For field tests,
in order to effectively improve the steam injection profile along horizontal well, besides the application of
dual-pipe well configuration, we can also change the well configuration method cycle by cycle. Thus, the
whole reservoir along the horizontal well can be unlocked.
SPE-195799-MS 13

Figure 12—Distribution of steam injection rate and steam quality along horizontal well
with different well configurations. (a) Average steam injection rate; (b) Steam quality.

Sensitivity analysis
In this section, based on the above model, the effects of different parameters on the behavior of heat transfer
and pressure drops of different hot fluids along horizontal wellbore are studied. Table 2 shows the wellbore
parameters and thermal physical properties we used.
The effect of reservoir permeability. Reservoir permeability is an important factor to affect the steam
conformance along horizontal well. As the permeability increases, the steam absorption rate is enhanced,
and thus the heating effect of reservoir is also improved. Based on the data in Table 2, the effect of reservoir
permeability on the transient fluid flow and heat transfer process in coupled horizontal wellbore-reservoir
system is simulated. The results are shown in Fig. 13. A positive correlation between steam injection profile
and reservoir permeability can be observed. As the reservoir permeability increases, the average steam
injection rate of each wellbore element is increased, and the effective heat length of horizontal well is
reduced. The average steam injection rate presented in Fig. 13(a) represents how much steam can be injected
into the reservoir under different permeabilities. From Fig. 13(a), it is shown that the effective heat length of
the horizontal well for the reservoir permeability of 500×10-3μm2 (110m) is about 2.4 times than the case of
4000×10-3μm2 (46m). For a given reservoir permeability, due to the influence of heat loss and steam outflow,
with the increase of distance from heel-end, the steam quality along the horizontal interval is gradually
decreased. Simultaneously, with the reservoir permeability increases, the steam quality is slightly increased.

Figure 13—The effect of permeability. (a) Effective heat length and average steam injection rate. (b) Steam quality.

The effect of permeability heterogeneity. On the other hand, for a long horizontal well, the permeability
distribution along the wellbore is usually non-uniform (heterogeneous). Accordingly, this behavior will
result in a serious non-uniform steam injection profile along the horizontal wellbore. In this section, based
on three types of non-uniform permeability distribution, as shown in Fig. 14, the effect of permeability
heterogeneity on the steam conformance is investigated. For the three different types of cases, the highest
permeability is respectively located in the heel-end part, middle part and toe-end part of the horizontal well.
14 SPE-195799-MS

The results are shown in Fig. 15. We can see that the steam conformance along horizontal wellbore is directly
related to the permeability distribution. The higher the permeability is, the higher the steam injection rate
is. Furthermore, the distribution of cumulative steam injection volume along the horizontal wellbore during
this CSS cycle is also compared, as shown in Fig. 15(b). We can see that under a same cyclic steam injection
volume (3000m3), the effective heating length of toe-end case is the longest.

Figure 14—Three cases of heterogeneous permeability distribution

Figure 15—The effect of permeability heterogeneity. (a) Distribution of steam injection rate
along horizontal wellbore; (b) Distribution of cumulative steam injection volume along
horizontal wellbore during a CSS cycle. The total cyclic steam injection volume is 3000m3.

The effect of steam injection rate. Steam injection rate mainly affects the total heat energy injected. Based
on the data in Table 2, the effect of steam injection rate on the steam conformance along horizontal well is
investigated. The results are shown in Fig. 16. For a given steam injection time, with the steam injection rate
increases, the average steam injection rate of every micro wellbore element is slightly reduced. On account
of the limited steam injection capability of reservoir, as the steam injection rate increases, the effective heat
length of horizontal well is increased. The effective heat length of horizontal well at 216 m3/d (103m) is
enhanced by about 30m than that of the case 120 m3/d (70m). Furthermore, from Fig. 16(b), we can see that
with the steam injection rate increases, the steam quality for a certain horizontal segment of the horizontal
wellbore is reduced.
SPE-195799-MS 15

Figure 16—The effect of steam injection rate. (a) Effective heat length and average steam injection rate. (b) Steam quality.

The effect of steam quality. Steam quality tremendously affects the enthalpy of steam injected. As the
steam quality increases, the heat energy per unit steam injected is increased. Based on the data in Table 2,
the effect of steam quality is also studied. The results are shown in Fig. 17. With the steam quality increases,
the average steam injection rate of reservoir is reduced, and the effective heat length of horizontal well is
increased. The effective heat length of horizontal well for the steam quality of 0.9 (109 m) is enhanced
by about 43.5 m than that of the case 0.5 (65.5 m). Furthermore, from Fig. 17(b), with the steam quality
increases, the steam quality along the horizontal wellbore is also increased.

Figure 17—The effect of steam quality. (a) Effective heat length and average steam injection rate. (b) Steam quality.

The effect of steam injection pressure. For a given reservoir pressure, steam injection pressure mainly
affects the total steam injection volume injected. As the increase of the differences between steam injection
pressure and reservoir pressure, the total steam volume injected is increased. But the injection pressure
should below the reservoir fracturing pressure. Based on the data in Table 2, the effect of steam injection
pressure is investigated. The results are shown in Fig. 18. With the steam injection pressure increases,
the average steam injection rate is on a rise. Simultaneously, the heating radius of horizontal well is also
increased, and the effective heat length of horizontal well is reduced. From Fig. 18(a), it is observed that
the effective heat length of horizontal well for the steam injection pressure at 10 MPa (60.8 m) is reduced
by about 92.2 m than that of the case 6 MPa (153 m). Also, with the steam injection pressure increases, the
steam quality along the horizontal intervals is increased.
16 SPE-195799-MS

Figure 18—The effect of steam injection pressure. (a) Effective heat length and average steam injection rate. (b) Steam quality.

The behavior of steam-NCG (non-condensable gas) mixtures

Compared with saturated steam, the addition of NCG components significantly improve the physical
properties of hot fluids. The density and viscosity of steam-NCG mixture is much lower, thus the pressure
drop along wellbore is reduced. But the expansion properties of steam-NCG mixture are enhanced. In
addition, because of the excellent thermal insulation behavior of NCG, the heat flux rate between wellbore
and reservoir is also reduced. In this section, the behavior of steam-NCG mixtures along horizontal well is
also simulated. The NCG components are composed of 15% CO2 and 85% N2. The simulation results for
the effect of NCG on the steam conformance along horizontal well are shown in Fig. 19. We can see that
under the same condition, the steam quality and pressure of steam-NCG mixture is much higher than that
of the saturated steam. And the effective heating length of steam-NCG mixture is increased by about 28m
than that of the saturated steam.

Figure 19—Simulation results of pure steam injection and steam-NCG mixture injection. (a) Steam quality; (b) Pressure.

Model application
Fig. 1 presents the temperature test results of an actual horizontal well in Liaohe oilfield, CNPC. For
this horizontal well, the average reservoir permeability is about 2054×10-3μm2, and the target formation is
Guantao group. Thus, the model developed in this paper is also used to predict the steam conformance of this
well. As shown in Fig. 1, the temperature of the first 150m of this well is higher. It indicates that the reservoir
producing degree closed to the heel-end section is higher. In comparison, for the last 200m segments of
this well (closed to the toe-end section), the producing degree is low. It is a typical thermal horizontal well
of “heel-good and toe-bad”. This steam injection heterogeneity directly affects the performance of steam
injection operation in horizontal well. Based on the mathematical models developed in this paper, the steam
conformance of this horizontal well is simulated. The results are shown in Fig. 20. As shown, the simulation
SPE-195799-MS 17

results are in good agreement with the test results. The simulated effective heating length of this horizontal
well is 146m. Compared with the tested result (152 m), the relative error is about 3.95%.

Figure 20—The simulation results of an actual horizontal well in Liaohe oilfield.

Conclusions
In this paper, a cylindrical wellbore physical model is developed firstly. Using this model, the steam injection
profile of horizontal well with different well configurations is experimentally discussed firstly. Then, a semi-
analytical model for the gas-liquid two phase flow in horizontal wellbore was developed to numerically
match the experimental observation. And a sensitivity analysis was conducted to explore the effect of
different sensitive parameters on the steam conformance along horizontal well. Furthermore, the behavior
of steam-NC mixture is also discussed. Experimental results indicated that the application of dual-pipe
well configuration can significantly enhance the oil drainage volume by about 35% than the single-pipe
well configuration. A bimodal temperature distribution and pressure distribution can be observed for the
dual-pipe well configuration. Dual-pipe well configuration is an important method to improve the steam
conformance along horizontal well. On the other hand, the simulation results of the semi-analytical model
developed in this paper can well match the experimental data. It can be used to effectively predict the
steam injection profile of horizontal well under different conditions. Because of the effect of variable-mass
flowing behavior and pressure drops, the wellbore segment closed to the steam outflow point can have a
higher heating radius than that far from the steam outflow point. Also, based on the results of sensitivity
analysis, permeability heterogeneity and steam injection parameters have a tremendously impact on the
steam injection profile along wellbore. Compared with pure steam injection process, the co-injection of
steam and NCG can improve the effective heating wellbore length by above 25%. This model is also applied
to predict the steam conformance of an actual horizontal well in Liaohe oilfield. This paper presents some
information regarding the heat and mass transfer of a dual-pipe horizontal well, as well as imparts some of
the lessons learned from its field operation.

Acknowledgements
This work was financially supported by the Beijing Natural Science Foundation (2184120), Science
Foundation of China University of Petroleum, Beijing (No. 2462016YJRC035) and National Science and
Technology Major Projects of China (2016ZX05031003004).

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