Investigation of permeability change in the Bandanna Coal Formation of the Fairview Field using time-lapse pressure transient analysis
A. Salmachi A C and J. Barkla BA Australian School of Petroleum, North Terrace, Adelaide, Australia.
B Santos Ltd, Brisbane, Australia.
C Corresponding author. Email: alireza.salmachi@adelaide.edu.au
The APPEA Journal 59(1) 289-301 https://doi.org/10.1071/AJ18184
Submitted: 10 December 2018 Accepted: 25 February 2019 Published: 17 June 2019
Abstract
Permeability of coal seam gas (CSG) reservoirs is stress/desorption dependent and may change during the life of the reservoir. This study investigates permeability change with depletion in several CSG wells in the Fairview Field: a prolific reservoir in the Bowen Basin, Australia. High-resolution pressure gauges at surface provide an opportunity to conduct time-lapse pressure transient analysis (PTA) on the wells that have multiple shut-ins. Pressure build-up tests can be replicated by calculating bottom-hole pressure when surface pressure (tubing and/or annulus) is recorded at high-resolution during any shut-in event. This eliminates the need to perform multiple well tests, which are time consuming and costly to run. The production history of 100 CSG wells was examined to find suitable candidates to perform time-lapse PTA. This was used to investigate how Bandanna Coal permeability changes with depletion. Three wells with high-quality shut-ins were identified and analysed to calculate effective permeability to gas and average reservoir pressure. The results indicate that coal permeability can enhance up to one order of magnitude during the life of a CSG well in the Fairview Field, and this can significantly improve production performance. These wells, located in a depleted area of the field, show rapid increase in permeability with decline in average reservoir pressure. The integration of rate transient analysis with the results of time-lapse PTA for one of the study wells reveals that the functional form of permeability increase is exponential in the study area, and a permeability modulus of –0.00678 psia–1 was obtained.
Keywords: Bowen Basin, coal seam gas, permeability, PTA, rate transient analysis.
Dr Alireza Salmachi is an Assistant Professor in the Australian School of Petroleum (ASP), the University of Adelaide. He holds a PhD in Petroleum Engineering from the University of Adelaide and an MSc degree in well design from the Curtin University of Technology. Alireza joined the ASP in 2013 where he conducts applied research, particularly on unconventional resources. He lectures drilling and well completion related topics to undergraduate and postgraduate students and is the program coordinator for the MSc Petroleum Engineering program in ASP. His research expertise includes fluid flow in unconventional gas reservoirs, well testing in hydraulically fractured wells, production data and rate transient analyses. Currently, Alireza leads industry oriented research projects to study production performance of deep coal seam gas reservoirs in the Cooper Basin. His research particularly investigates permeability enhancement and sweet spot identification in deep coal seams of the Cooper Basin. |
James Barkla is a Reservoir Engineer at Santos. He has a BEng in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering from The University of Queensland and an MSc in Petroleum Engineering from Heriot-Watt University. He is a member of the Society of Petroleum Engineers and Engineers Australia. |
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