Laboratory Model Study of Single Five-Spot and Single Injection Well Pilot Waterflooding
Authors: Craig F.F. 
Published: December 2007

Many full-scale waterflooding operations are preceded by pilot floods, one purpose of which is to provide an estimate of recoverable oil. A laboratory model study was made to determine the influence of the producing wells' effective productivity on the oil recovery efficiency of single five-spot pilots, as well as single injection well pilot floods. The effective productivity is indicated by the value of Condition Ratio, defined as the actual well productivity to that of an undamaged and non-stimulated, normal-sized well in the same formation. The effects of initial gas saturation and mobility ratio on recovery efficiency were also investigated in this model study.

Model test results showed that at favorable mobility ratios, a five-spot pilot flood can provide a direct quantitative estimate of the recoverable oil in the pilot area. If the pilot producer's Condition Ratio is 2.2 or more, upwards of 90 per cent of the recoverable oil in the pilot area is recovered from the inside producer, regardless of the mobility ratio or initial gas saturation. This Condition Ratio can be achieved with present fracturing techniques. Model studies also showed that over the range of imposed injection pressure differences and regional pressure gradients normally encountered in field operations, there was no effect on the recovery efficiency of a five-spot pilot waterflood.

Model studies of single injection well pilot waterfloods showed that with no initial gas saturation, the total oil recovery at the offset producing wells can indicate the oil recovery possible by full-scale waterflooding. It is essential that the Condition Ratios of the offset wells be above 1.4. If an initial gas saturation exists prior to water injection, the recoverable oil cannot be directly evaluated by a single injection well pilot flood. However, the production performance of such a flood can be used to provide information on volumetric sweep efficiency.

INTRODUCTION

Oil reservoirs are complex structures and cannot always be fully studied in the laboratory. Therefore, many operators consider it prudent to evaluate a waterflood prospect by means of a pilot flood.

Pilot waterfloods generally involve one of two well arrangements: a single five-spot pilot waterflood, involving four injectors and an internal pilot producing well; and a single injection well pilot flood (sometimes called an inverted five-spot pilot) having one injector and four surrounding pilot producers. Some pilot floods are composed of multiple five-spot pilot patterns. To yield information applicable to field-wide performance, the pilot must be located in a representative portion of the reservoir.

Pilot floods generally are conducted for one or more of the following reasons:to determine whether water could be injected at desirably high rates,to determine whether an oil bank or zone of increased oil saturation is formed by water injection, andto estimate the oil recovery by waterflooding.

Many of the early pilot waterfloods were conducted for only the first two reasons. As soon as a buzz in oil production was obtained in the pilot, water injection was initiated throughout the entire lease or field.

A number of laboratory studies have been directed toward determining conditions under which a pilot flood could yield a quantitative estimate of the oil recovery possible by full-scale pattern flooding.

One of the early studies of single five-spot pilot flooding1 showed that well damage to the inside pilot producer could reduce the total amount of oil recovered. In a study of the single injection well pilot flood pattern,2 the results indicated that if the model boundaries were no closer than a half-well spacing beyond the pilot pattern, the pilot performance in the laboratory is unaffected by these boundaries. In another study3 the effect of initial gas saturation and mobility ratio on the ratio of production to injection rate for various groupings of five-spot patterns was defined by mathematical and analog methods.

In a study4 involving both potentiometric and flow model experiments at a mobility ratio of unity, four different pilot patterns were studied. These included a single five-spot, a single injection well pilot, a cluster of four single injection well pilots and six inverted five-spots. In this study the ratio of well diameter to the distance between injection and producing wells was held constant at 1:1000. The effect of the p ratio - the ratio of the pressure drawdown at the producing wells to the pressure build-up at the injection wells on the pilot performance - was studied. The values of p ratio ranged from 0 to 0.34. Results showed that both the total oil recovery and the total fluid production from the pilot relative to the cumulative injection increased with increasing values of the p ratio.