Monitoring well cementing operations using distributed fibre optic sensing
Ludovic Paul Ricard A * and Elaheh Arjomand BA CSIRO, Perth, WA, Australia.
B CSIRO, Melbourne, Vic., Australia.
The APPEA Journal 62 S165-S168 https://doi.org/10.1071/AJ21215
Accepted: 11 March 2022 Published: 13 May 2022
© 2022 The Author(s) (or their employer(s)). Published by CSIRO Publishing on behalf of APPEA.
Abstract
Subsurface resources operations are critically dependent on the behaviour of the well through its lifetime. While the production and injection stages are commonly monitored both at surface and downhole, the monitoring of completion installation, work-overs and decommissioning are performed mostly at surface. Yet, most recently, improvements in distributed fibre optic sensing (DFOS) technology have made downhole monitoring more tractable and enables access to data previously not available. The technology has a very small downhole footprint, low cost and provides high spatial resolution from the surface to the bottom of the well. DFOS has to date been successfully demonstrated for site characterisation via vertical seismic profiling and perforations performances assessment, providing a high-resolution description of the subsurface leading to a better-informed decision. In this work, we focus on illustrating via case studies the benefits of the technology for insights on completion installation and well integrity. Well cementing operations are critical for providing zonal isolation over the life of a well. The deployment of a casing-conveyed fibre optic cable enabled the real-time surveillance of the displacement of mud by cement, the cement equilibration and the cement curing processes. This information allowed the identification of inflow zones and cavities in the well. In another example of cement plug installation, the same technology was used to identify leakage to the formation as well as the timing and depth of the cement plugs at very high spatial resolution.
Keywords: analysis, cement, depth profile, fibre optic, monitoring, temperature, well integrity.
Ludovic Ricard is a Reservoir Engineer at CSIRO Energy. He holds a MSc from the University of Bordeaux I and a PhD in Earth Sciences from the University of Paris XI. He joined CSIRO Energy as Reservoir Engineer for geothermal energy projects, later moving to carbon geosequestration and unconventional reservoirs. Currently he is the CSIRO lead of distributed temperature sensing and managing operations at the CSIRO In-Situ Laboratory research site. He is a member of SPE, SPWLA, FESAus and EAGE. |
Elaheh Arjomand has started her post-doc fellowship with CSIRO in mid-2019 and her research is mainly focused on the maintaining the integrity of the decommissioned oil and gas wells and exploring novel sealing materials and technologies for plugging and decommissioning. Elaheh got her PhD on the integrity of the cement sheath within wells while subjected to pressure and temperature variations from the University of Adelaide in 2018. |
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