SPE 150858

Cased Hole Formation Resistivity Evaluation Results in Successful

Identification and Isolation of Watered out Zones in Nubia Formation
Sherif Ghadiry, Schlumberger, Abdallah Ismail, Eshpetco

Copyright 2012, Society of Petroleum Engineers

This paper was prepared for presentation at the North Africa Technical Conference and Exhibition held in Cairo, Egypt, 20–22 February 2012.

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 of the paper have not been
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Abstract
Water production is one of the main challenges facing oil and gas producers. It is necessary to carefully manage
water production in order to enhance oil production. In order to identify watered out zones, a time lapse cased
hole resistivity survey was carried out to evaluate hydrocarbon saturation.
In static conditions, the value of cased hole resistivity over other time lapse techniques resides in its deep depth of
investigation, which results in increased immunity to borehole fluid reinvasion.
This technique was applied on three wells, where the water cut was ranging from 65 % to 90 %. The cased hole
formation resistivity clearly identified the watered out zones. A water shutoff operation followed. The objective of
the cased hole resistivity acquisition was met as the water cut dropped down to 1 to 40 % after isolation of the
watered out zones.

Introduction
In static conditions, the cased hole formation resistivity measurement provides a significant advantage over other
cased hole saturation evaluation measurements such as pulsed neutron measurements. This is due to its deeper
depth of investigation which is more than an order of magnitude deeper than that of nuclear measurements in the
logging conditions encountered in this case study. The depth of investigation of the through-casing resistivity is
defined as the depth within which 50% of the measured signal is coming from (Van Steene et al, 2008). The depth
of investigation was estimated to be from 21 inch to 49 inch in the studied area. In addition, there is no restriction
on the minimum porosity or the minimum formation water salinity in which the data can be acquired.

The cased hole formation resistivity was run in three wells in the Nubia formation, which is divided in this area of
the Gulf of Suez into two main sandstone intervals with calcite cementation. The Nubia formation is overlaying
the basement. The water salinity is about 165 ppk (NaCl equivalent). The formation water salinity remained the
same throughout production history since no water injection is carried out in this field. The porosity ranges from
15 to 25 pu. The open hole resistivity ranges from 1 ohm.m to 100 ohm.m, which is the optimum range for cased
hole formation resistivity measurement.Since the wells are produced using electric submersible pumps, it was not
possible to log the well under flowing conditions. The wells had to be killed and hence, deep reinvasion of
borehole fluid was expected.
2 SPE 150858

Tool Measurement Principle

The cased hole formation resistivity principle of measurement is to inject high current from the (upper) electrode
into the casing (Beguin et al, 2000). The current flows both up and down to a return electrode at surface. It mostly
flows in the casing but there is some leakage of current into the formation.
Since we measure the casing current via its voltage drop in the casing segment resistance, we must also measure
casing resistance accurately. Typical formations have resistivity about 1 billion times that of steel casing. During
the cased hole formation resistivity measurement the currents escaping to the formation cause a drop in the casing
resistance of a few tens of micro-ohms. Since the leaked current is typically on the order of several milliamperes,
the potential difference measured by the cased hole formation resistivity tool is in nanovolts.

Since the noise created by tool movement would be 10,000 times greater than the measured signal, the tool makes
stationary measurements. The 2-min station time, which includes a down hole calibration, translates into a
logging speed of 200~240 ft/hr. Formations with resistivities from 1 to 100 ohm-m can be measured with ±10%
accuracy; longer station times improve the accuracy and extend the range of measurable resistivities. To obtain
the tool-casing contact essential to the cased hole formation resistivity measurement, the small voltage electrodes
on the sonde are designed to push through small amounts of casing scale and corrosion to establish good electrical
contact (Benimeli et al, 2002).

Saturation Computation
Petrophysical interpretation was carried out using the open hole data such as neutron porosity, density, pef,
laterolog resistivity and gamma ray to compute the clay volume, mineral volumes, effective porosity and water
saturation.
In order to compute the current water saturation, the mineralogy and porosity from the open hole formation
evaluation were used and the cased hole resistivity replaced the deep laterolog resisitivity in the model. The
original water saturation and current time-lapse water saturation were then compared.
In well-1 (see Figure 2), the initial water saturation was 20% against zone 1 (X580 ft to X630 ft) and zone 2 (from
X645 ft to X690 ft). The CHFR time lapse analysis showed that the water saturation increased to 60% against
zone 2 and increased to 25% against zone 1.
In well-2 (see Figure 3), the initial water saturation of zone 1 (X555 ft to X620 ft) and zone 2 (X625 ft to X685 ft)
was 20%. The cased hole saturation computation showed that the water saturation increased to 25% in zone 1, and
that the water saturation increased to 60% in the middle of zone 2. In this case, the water was mostly coming from
the middle of zone 2 .
In well-3 (seeFigure 4), the initial water saturation of zone 1 (X770 ft to X820 ft) and zone 2 (X830 ft to X880 ft)
was 5%. The cased hole analysis revealed that the water saturation had increased to 10% at the base of zone 1. In
zone 2, the bottom interval was completely watered out with a residual hydrocarbon saturation of 25% on
average, while in the most top interval of this zone, the water saturation increased to 20%.

Water Shutoff Results

Perforation isolation was the mitigation measure used to decrease the water production flux. A bridge plug was
placed at the top of the main water source. After performing the watered out zone isolation, the water production
in the three wells was reduced by variable amounts.
In well-1, the initial water production was 1%. It increased to 10 % after one year of production and reached 90%.
After isolation of the watered out zone at X645 ft, the water cut dropped back to initial water production level of
1% (see Figure 5).
In well-2, the initial water production was 1%. It increased after a few months of production to 10% then reached
a maximum of 67%. After isolation of the zone at X620 ft, the water cut dropped to 40% (see Figure 6). The
Nubia formation in the studied area is different from the usual massive clean sandstone reservoirs encountered in
other areas of the Gulf of Suez. The calcite cementation could play a big role in the vertical and horizontal
permeabilities, which may explain the water breakthrough observed in well-2.
In well-3, a different behavior was observed. The initial water cut was 1%, and then increased significantly to
65% within a few months. After isolation of the zone below X825 ft, the water cut dropped to 35% (see Figure 7).
The base of zone-1 shows a slight increase in the water saturation between X800 ft and X803 ft and this could be
the source of water after isolation.
SPE 150858 3

Conclusions
The time lapse cased hole resistivity is one of the most effective technologies available to quantify the remaining
hydrocarbon saturation and identify watered out reservoir units. In the case study presented, zone 2 is the main
source of water as the lateral water movement causes water breakthrough in well-2, well-1 and well-3, with a
gradual water saturation increase in zone 2 of up to 60% in well-1 and 70% in well-3. After performing the
mechanical isolation of the water source, the water production decreased significantly. In well-1 and well-2, it
decreased respectively to 1% and to 40%. In well-3, the water production decreased to 35%.

References

Beguin. P., Benimeli, D., Boyd, A., Dubourg, I. Ferreira, A., McDougall, A., Rouault, G., and Vander Wal, P.:
"Recent Progress on Formation Resistivity Measurement Through Casing", Transactions of the SPWLA 41 st
Annual Logging Symposium, Dallas, Texas, June 4-7, 2000, paper CC.

Benimeli, D., Levesque, C., Rouault, G., Dubourg, I., Pehlivan, H., McKeon, D., Faivre, O., Rebolledo, K., : "A
new Technique for Faster Resistivity Measurements in Cased Hole", Transactions of the SPWLA 43 st Annual
Logging Symposium, Japan, June 2-5, 2002, paper Y.

Van Steene, Herold, B., Dutta, D.J., Abugren, Y., Hosny, S., Badr, A.B., Mahgoub, I., Zidan, A., ”Using the
Optimal Through-Casing Measurement to Maximize Oil Recovery: A Case Study From The Western Desert,
Egypt” Abu Dhabi International Petroleum Exhibition and Conference held in Abu Dhabi, 3–6 November 2008.

Figuers

Figure 1 Cased hole formation resistivity measurement principle showing the tool configuration and the current path
down hole (the cased hole formation resisitivity tool inject current into casing with return at surface. The casing acts
as electrode, forcing current deep into formation) (D. Benimeli et al, 2002)
4 SPE 150858

Perforation

Bridge plug

Figure 2 Well-1 time lapse results. Track 1: GR, Caliper, bit size, Track 2: depth, Track 3: laterolog resistivity, cased
hole resistivity, Track 4: neutron porosity, density, pef, density correction, perforation flag, Track 5: open hole
saturation and cased hole saturation with the effect of depletion shown with blue shading while the remaining oil is
shown with green shading, Track6: petrophysical minerals and fluid volumes from the open hole evaluation.
SPE 150858 5

Bridge plug

Figure 3 Well-2 time lapse results. Track 1: GR, Caliper, bit size, Track 2: depth, Track 3: laterolog resistivity, cased
hole resistivity, Track 4: neutron porosity, density, pef, density correction, perforation flag, Track5: petrophysical
minerals and fluid volumes from the open hole evaluation Track 6: open hole saturation and cased hole saturation
with the effect of depletion shown with blue shading while the remaining oil is shown with green shading.
6 SPE 150858

Bridge plug

Figure 4 Well-3 time lapse results. Track 1: GR, Caliper, bit size, Track 2: depth, Track 3: laterolog resistivity, cased
hole resistivity, Track 4: neutron porosity, density, pef, density correction, perforation flag, Track5: petrophysical
minerals and fluid volumes from the open hole evaluation Track 6: open hole saturation and cased hole saturation
with the effect of depletion shown with blue shading while the remaining oil is shown with green shading.
SPE 150858 7

Figure 5 Well-1 production history before and after mechanical isolation, which took place in March 2011, after
which water production decreased to 1%. The red line is the total fluid per day, the green line is the oil per day and
light blue is the water percentage per day.

Figure 6 Well-2 production history before and after mechanical isolation, which took place in Oct. 2010, after which
water production decreased to 45%. The red line is the total fluid per day, the green line is the oil per day and light
blue is the water percentage per day.
8 SPE 150858

Figure 7 Well-3 production history before and after mechanical isolation, which took placein June 2010, after which
water production decreased to 40%. The red line is the total fluid per day, the green line is the oil per day and light
blue is the water percentage per day.