GEOE 412.

3 RESERVOIR MECHANICS
Detailed Outline (1)

1. ROCK PROPERTIES

1.1 Porosity

1.2 Permeability

1.3 Compressibility

1.4 Darcy's Law Review

2. RESERVOIR FLUID PROPERTIES

2.1 Hydrocarbon Composition

2.2 Phase Relationships

3. MULTIPHASE FLOW

3.1 Relative Permeability

3.2 Capillary Forces

3.3 Multiphase Flow Laws

3.4 Immiscible Displacement

3.4.1 Fractional Flow

3.4.2 Segregated Flow

GEOE 412.3 RESERVOIR MECHANICS
Detailed Outline (2)

4. RESERVOIR EVALUATION

4.1 Types of Reservoir

4.2 Volumetrics

4.3 Material Balance

4.4 Decline Curves

4.5 Pressure Transient Analysis

4.5.1 Oil Wells

4.5.2 Gas Wells

5. ENHANCED RECOVERY TECHNIQUES

5.1 Water Flooding

5.2 Polymer Flooding

5.3 Miscible Flooding

5.3.1 CO2 Flooding

5.3.2 LPG Flooding

5.4 Thermal Recovery

5.4.1 Fire Flooding

5.4.2 Steam Flooding

5.4.3 Cyclic Steam Injection

 What is Reservoir Engineering?

Reservoir Engineering deals with the transfer of fluids

to, from and within natural underground reservoirs.

What do Reservoir Engineers do?

Reservoir Engineers have four primary functions:

1. Estimate how much hydrocarbon is in place.

- How much do we have?

2. Calculate recovery factors.

- How much can we get?

3. Determine the time scale for recovery.

- How quickly can we get it?

4. Assess the economics of the pool or field.

- How much will we make?
 RESERVOIR ENGINEERING

In recent years, reservoir engineers have

functioned in two main areas:

1. Exploration and development of new

pools

 Evaluation of well economics

 Optimization of well locations
 Pressure / recovery predictions

2. Optimization of already discovered

pools

 Infill drilling to capture bypassed pay.

 Well re-completions
 Well stimulation
 Waterfloods and EOR
FUTURE OF RESERVOIR ENGINEERING

Reservoir Engineers are most effective as

an integral part of a team dedicated to
increasing the value of the company. The
skill set will be:

1. A basic grounding in rocks, fluids, wells

productivity, drive mechanisms etc

2. An understanding of reserve
classification.

3. Some knowledge of probability,

uncertainty and risk analysis.

4. Experience in using state-of-the-art

computing tools.

5. Communications skills.
 COURSE OBJECTIVES

An introductory course cannot deliver the

full skill set. We will start by trying to
provide a grounding in the basics:

 Rock and fluid properties

 Principles of multiphase flow
 Reserve calculations
 Well testing and analysis
 Reservoir simulation
 Introduction to EOR
 SOFTWARE TOOLS

We have some of the computing tools and

where possible they will be used:

 Reservoir Mapping
 GEOGRAPHIX, ACCUMAP
 Gas Field Analysis
 FOREGAS, PROCAST
 Pressure Transient Analysis
 Various PTA packages
 Reservoir Simulation
 JABOS, BOAST
 POROSITY

Definition: Porosity is volume of voids

over total volume n = Vv / Vt
Definition: Void Ratio is volume of voids
over volume of solids e = Vv / Vs

solids

voids

Vt = Vs + Vv and
Vv = V t - V s
Dividing by Vt : n = Vv / Vt = 1 - Vs / Vt
Vs / V t = 1 - n
Dividing by Vs : e = Vt / Vs - 1
Vt / V s = 1 + e
Thus: (1 - n) = (1 + e)-1
n = e (1 + e)-1 and
e = n (1 - n)-1
 POROSITY AND VOID RATIO

Both porosity and void ratio are

dimensionless quantities expressed as
fractions or percentages.

Porosity (%) Void Ratio (%)

5 5.26
10 11.1
15 17.6
20 25.0
25 33.3
30 42.9
35 53.9
40 66.7
45 81.8
50 100
55 122
60 150
65 186
70 233
 POROSITY TYPES

Primary porosity is original interstitial or

inter-granular void space.

Secondary porosity is void space

developed by fractures or solution.

Effective porosity is the volume of inter-

connected voids per unit volume.

Dual porosity is void space made up of

components with different origins. For
example, inter-granular and fracture;
fracture and solution; etc

PORE SIZE FREQUENCY PLOTS

Single Dual
 CONTROLS ON POROSITY

Packing - how grains or clasts are packed

together.

Sorting - particle size distribution.

Clast porosity - porosity within clasts or

fragments.

Fracturing porosity - secondary porosity

added by stress and deformation.

Solution porosity - secondary porosity

added by solid fluid interaction.

Primary porosity is often destroyed.

Geological processes continuously change
effective reservoir porosity through time.
The origin of porosity is often complex.
Geological history determines porosity.
 REPRESENTATIVE ELEMENTARY
VOLUME

The representative elementary volume

(REV) is a key concept in understanding
porosity (and other material properties).

Measured porosity depends on the scale

of the measurement.

For very small Vt , we could measure all

void (100%) or all mineral grain (0%). The
porosity we sample has a very large
variance.

As Vt increases, the measured porosity

becomes more predictable (less variance).

When Vt becomes large enough to include

macroscopic fractures (joints), the
measured porosity will become larger and
more variable.
 THINGS TO THINK ABOUT

1. How do processes like consolidation,

diagenesis and weathering effect porosity?

2. Do you expect core from deep wells to

give the same porosity values as cores
from outcrop?

3. Does porosity change when we change

the fluid pressure or the fluid chemistry?

4. What is the REV for a computer model of

a reservoir?

5. How do drilling fluids effect porosity

around wellbores?

6. What do fracing and acidizing do to

porosity?
 COMPRESSIBILITY

Definition: Compressibility is change in

volumetric strain per unit of applied stress
or pressure. d(V/Vo) / dP

Compressibility is the reciprocal of the bulk

modulus and has units of Pa-1 or psi-1.
(1 psi-1 = 1.45 x 10 -4 Pa-1).

Both rock or pore skeletons () and fluids

() have compressibilities.

Rock or pore skeleton compressibilities are

generally in the range 10 -5 to 10 -6 psi-1 or 10
-9
to 10 -10 Pa-1 (0.1 to 1 GPa -1).

For fluids, isothermal compressibilities are

defined at a specific temperature.

For water, w = 0.44 GPa-1 at 20o C.

 POROUS MEDIA COMPRESSIBILITY

Rock compressibility is not a constant. It

varies considerably for different rock and
soil types.

Rock or Soil Type  (GPa -1)

Clay 1000 to 10
Sand 100 to 1
Gravel 10 to 0.1
Jointed Rock 10 to 0.1
Sound Rock 1 to 0.01

Compressibility depends on the loading

history of the material and commonly
shows hysteresis.
e


 EFFECTIVE STRESS PRINCIPLE

In fluid saturated porous media, if we

increase the fluid pressure dp = dh a
volume change takes place:

1. The pore pressure increases and the

fluid in the pores is compressed by an
amount n.

2. The effective stress decreases and the

rock skeleton expands by an amount 

The net change in pore volume per unit

pressure change is:

d(V/Vo)/dp = + n.

d(V/Vo) = (+ n.dp

d(V/Vo) = (+ n.dh

 HYDRAULIC CONDUCTIVITY

From our knowledge of groundwater flow

we all remember Darcy's experiments in
1856 leading to the flow law:

q = Q/ A = - K. dh/dL

where
q is the specific discharge [L/T]
Q is the volumetric flow rate [L3/T]
A is the flow cross section [L2]
K is hydraulic conductivity [L/T]
dh/dL is the hydraulic gradient []

The constant of proportionality (K) obtained

by Henri Darcy depends on the properties
of both the fluid (in Darcy’s experiments,
water) and the porous medium (in Darcy’s
experiments, sand and gravel).
 PERMEABILITY

Darcy (through many experiments) found

that the K varies empirically as follows:

1. K increases with p.m. grain size d2

2. K increases with fluid density 
3. K decreases with fluid viscosity 

Combining these empirical results:

K = Cd2= k

where
C is a sorting/packing coefficient []
d is the grain/pore diameter [L]
 is the fluid specific weight [F/L3]
 is the fluid viscosity [FT/L2]

k = Cd2 is a property of the porous medium

only, called the permeability [L2].
 PERMEABILITY UNITS

Intrinsic permeability (k) has the dimensions

of area. The permeability unit used by the
oil industry is the darcy or millidarcy.

Q = (k / ). dh/dL = (k / ). dp/dL

One darcy is the permeability necessary to

provide a specific discharge of 1 cm.s-1 in a
fluid of viscosity 1 cp under a pressure
gradient of 1 atm.cm-1.

1 darcy = 9.87 x 10 -9 cm2 10 -8 cm2

10 -12 m2
1 m2
1 millidarcy (md) 10 -11 cm2
10 -15 m2
10 -3 m2
 PERMEABILITY MAGNITUDE

A hydraulic conductivity of 10 -5 ms-1 for

water at 20o C is approximately equivalent
to 1 darcy.

This corresponds to the permeability of an

unconsolidated, medium-fine sand or
perhaps a coarse-grained sandstone.

Petroleum reservoir rocks typically have

permeabilities in the range 1 to 1000
millidarcies.

One millidarcy is often used as a rule-of-

thumb for net-pay cutoff purposes.
 FLOW VELOCITY

Specific discharge q has the dimensions of

velocity [L/T] but is not the advective flow
rate.

The flow per unit cross sectional area Q/A

applies to the fluid phase only - the porous
medium does not move!

The average linear velocity or advective

velocity (v) is given by:

v=q/n

where
v is the advective velocity
q is the specific discharge
n is the porosity

The advective velocity is greater than the

specific discharge v >> q.
 PERMEABILITY VALUES

Geological materials have a huge range of

permeability. More than 12 orders of
magnitude!

There have been many attempts to

estimate k using porosity (n) and grain size
(d). The most famous empirical estimates
are the Kozeny-Carman equation:

k = Ckcd2n3 / (1 - n)2

and Hazen’s formula:

k = Chd2

where the Ckc and Ch parameters are

dimensionless constants.
 Assignment

Find values of these constants (Ckc and Ch)

if k is in millidarcies and d is in micro-
metres?

Use the Kozeny-Carmen equation and

Hazen’s formula to estimate k for clean,
well-sorted, fine, medium and coarse
sands.

Find at least two additional empirical

equations to estimate permeability from
grain-size and apply them.
 THINGS TO THINK ABOUT

1. What dominates the system

compressibility for an unconsolidated and a
consolidated reservoir?

2. Is there a relationship between porosity

and permeability?

3. How do factors like inhomogeneity and

anisotropy affect average reservoir
permeability?

4. How do these factors affect flow

velocity?

5. What kind of variability in permeability

would you expect in fluvial sandstones,
deltaic sandstones, bedded limestones,
and reef limestones?