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Abstract
Ball sealer diversion has been proven to be both an effective
and economic way to selectively stimulate low permeability
oil and gas reservoirs in hydraulic fracturing and matrix
acidizing treatments. However, the design and implementation
of a successful ball sealer diversion treatment is still a
challenge. Often the designer depends on experience, and
lacks the knowledge of accurate ball transport and sealing
behaviors. An integrated model for selecting operating factors
such as fluid and ball properties, as well as predicting the ball
sealers transport and hydraulic behavior prior to pumping is
needed for optimizing the stimulation process.
In this paper, an integrated transport model is presented to
describe the relationships among the ball sealer transport
sealing behavior, wellbore deviation, wall effect, perforation
density and size, fluid properties, pumping rate and ball
properties. In addition, the smoothness of ball, perforation
phasing, and velocity profile inside the wellbore during ball
seating are also taken into consideration. Recommendations
are provided for determining the number of ball sealers per job
for either single or multiple stage treatment, the designed
pumping rate, and the physical properties of the fluid and ball
sealer. A hydraulic analysis model is presented for the overall
fluid dynamics starting from surface, through wellbore, to
reservoir. This analysis describes the effects of reservoir
condition, pressure drop on perforations, and actual sealing
efficiency on the surface treatment pressure profile. This paper
will investigate the effects of the diversion factors on the ball
transport behaviors such as transport time, ball sealer
efficiency and surface pressure.
Introduction
One of the first ball sealer process was performed by the
Western Company in 1956[1]. Since then, it has been widely
du
BV B dtB = BV B g + T n dS
S
(1)
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T n dS = FD + FPG + FA + FL
(2)
Re<3
3<Re<500
Re>500
Fw = 1 (d B / D) 2.25
(3)
Fw = 1 (d B / D)1.5
(4)
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where
Pwf(t) : flowing pressure at center of top zone;
Pi : reservoir initial pressure;
Q : pump rate, BPM;
: fluid viscosity, cp;
B : fluid volume factor;
n : the number of unsealed perforations;
N : total number of perforations of this zone;
k : reservoir permeability, Md;
h : reservoir thickness, ft;
re(t) : radius of drainage at time t, ft
rw : wellbore radius;
re (t ) = 0.0037[kt / ct ]
0.5
(6)
where
: porosity, %;
t : pump time, min;
ct : total compressibility, 1/psi;
The surface treating pressure is obtained by adjusting
bottomhole pressure with frictional and hydrostatic pressures.
The surface increase delta P after pumped a time t is:
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From this figure, it turns out the phasing has little effecs on the
ball transport time in the casing. In general, the ball
trajectories in the fluid are fairly complicated because both
translational and rotational motions should be simultaneously
considered and these motions are coupled. To simplify the
simulation process, we assume that the ball trajectory follows
a certain pattern along the fluid transport. Statistically, the
instantaneous balls transport velocity consists of the mean
velocity and a fluctuating velocity. Under the same Reynolds
number and other conditions, the perforations phasing
orientation may not change the local disturbance or
perturbation. On the other hand, the perforation phasing does
not change the balls transport length within the shot density
of 1~12 shots/ft. Hence, the phasing has a little effect on the
balls transport behaviors.
Ball transport time
Table 1 lists partially data that present the relationship
between transport time and wellbore measured depth. Internal
experiments show that the ball transport time in reality is
longer that that of this simulator.
The reasons for this behavior may be explained as follows.
From Equation (2), we could find that the forces on the ball
when the ball is moving through a fluid are quite complex. As
we discussed in the above section, for a fast moving ball, there
will be some point on the ball where the flow separates,
creating a turbulent wake behind the ball. As the pressure
differential between the leading surface of the ball and the
surface within the turbulent wake arrives at a critical point, it
may cause the ball to migrate laterally and spin. So the
spinning of the ball in the fluid could result in the retarded ball
in the transport time. The spinning of solid particles in fluid is
a very complex topic in physics of fluids, which is out of the
scope of this paper.
The ball spinning will cause a lift force for the ball. This is so
called Magnus effect. This lift force is usually perpendicular
to the direction of the fluid flow and related to the angular
velocity of the fluid flow. This force is not easy to calculate
analytically in the fluid dynamics. Although Joseph et al[12]
proposed a DNS (direct Numerical simulation) method to
compute the slip velocity in the low Reynolds number range
with the lift force is taken into account, there still no
experimental data to confirm it.
Overall, both the lateral migration and lift force may cause the
retarded movement of ball along the centerline in the casing
and then increase the balls transport time.
Inclined and Horizontal Well
Figure 6 shows the effect of wellbore inclination on the ball
sealers performance. In this test case (Test Case B except the
shot density is 4 shots/ft), the ball sealer efficiency increases
as the wellbore inclination angle increases, while the nonseated ball percentage decreases as the inclination angle
increases. Under the same conditions, the inclination angle
mainly changes the settling velocity of ball, which changes
ball inertia force, ball diverting force, as well as the holding
force.
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Conclusions
1. An integrated transport model is developed on the basis of
Lagrangian approach with one-way coupling effect in the fluid
dynamics.
2. This ball sealer simulator is capable of dealing with both
Newtonian and Non-Newtonian fluids. Several main factors
such as wall effect, wellbore geometry, fluid and ball
properties, perforation shot density and pump rate are taken
into account in this software.
3. The simulation results show that the time period from
unsteady state to the steady state is quiet short.
4. The test cases in this paper demonstrate that the ball sealer
efficiency decreases as the perforation shot density increases,
while the ball sealer efficiency decreases as the perforation
discharge coefficient increases.
5. Drag coefficient, surface smoothness, and wellbore
inclination angle play an important role in the ball sealer
diverting process.
6. This simulator also provides hydraulic anlysis integrating
with reservoir information during the ball sealer process.
Nomenclature
API
= American Petroleum Institute
B
= fluid volume factor
CFD
= Computational Fluid Dynamics
Cp
= discharge coefficient
ct
= total compressibility, 1/psi
DNS
= Direct Numerical Simulation
h
= reservoir thickness, ft
k
= reservoir permeability, Md
LDA
= Laser Doppler Anemometry
N
= total number of perforations of this zone
n
= the number of unsealed perforations
= reservoir initial pressure
Pi
PIV
= Particle Image Velocimetry
Pwf(t) = flowing pressure at center of top zone
Q
= pump rate, BPM
RCN
= Rubber Coated Neoprene
= radius of drainage at time t, ft
re(t)
rw
= wellbore radius
T
= the instantaneous stress tensor
t
= pump time, min
= the volume of the ball
VB
References
1. Harrison, N.W.: Diverting Agents Their History and
Application, J. Pet. Tech. (May 1972)593-598.
2. Brown, R.W., Neill, G.H., Loper, R.G.: Factors
Influencing Optimum Ball Sealer Performance, J. Pet.
Tech. (April 1963) 450-454.
3. Bale G.E.,: Matrix Acidizing in Saudi Arabia by Using
Buoyant Ball Sealers, J. Pet. Tech. (October 1984)17481753.
4. Erbstosser, S. R.: Improved Ball Sealer Diversion,J.
Pet. Tech. (Nov. 1980)1903-1910.
5. Babiano, A., Cartwright, J. H. E., Piro, O., Provenzale,
A.: Dynamics of Small Neutrally Buoyant Sphere in a
Fluid and Targeting in Hamiltonian Systems, Phys. Rev.
Lett.,(June 2000)5764-5767.
6. Clift, R., Grace, J. R., Webber, M. E.: Bubbles, Drop and
Particles, Academic Press, New York, 1978.
7. Felice, R., Gibilaro, L. G., Foscolo, P. U.: On the
hindered Falling Velocity of Spheres in the inertial Flow
Regime, Chem . Engr. Sci., (1995)30053006.
8. Govier, G. W., Aziz, K. The Flow of Complex
Mixturesin Pipe, Litton Educational Publishing Inc.,
New York, (1972)4-13.
9. Bird, R.B., Stewart, W. E., Lightfoot, E. N.:Transport
Phenomena, John Wiley and Sons Inc., 2002.
10. Chen, C. Y., Arkinson C.:Flow Efficiency Of Perforated
Systems- A Combined Analytical And Numerical
Treatmnent,(2001), J. of Engr. Math., 159-178..
11. Patankar, N.A., Huang, P.Y., Ko,T., Joseph D.D. : Liftoff of a single particle in Newtonian and viscoelastic
fluids by direct numerical simulation,(2001), J. Fluid
Mech., 438, 67-100.
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Velocity, ft/min
70
60
7/8" Ball,S.G.=1.3,
Settling Velocity
7/8" Ball,S.G.=1.1,
Settling Velocity"
7/8" Ball,S.G.=0.9,
Rising Velocity
50
40
30
20
10
0
0
0.5
1.5
2.5
Time, s
Figure 1. Ball Velocity as a function of time
100
80
60
40
Dimpled ball
20
Smooth ball
0
0
0.5
1.5
Time, second
Figure 2. Ball smoothness effect on the settling velocity
2.5
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Efficiency(%)
100
80
60
40
20
0
0
10
11
12
Unsaeted or unholded
perforations, %
Unseated
Unholded
10
11
12
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50
100
150
200
Phasing
20
40
60
80
100
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1000
100
900
90
800
80
700
70
600
60
500
50
400
40
300
Open Perfs
30
200
20
100
10
0
0
10
15
20
25
30
Pump Time
1449.7
1449.8
1450.0
1450.2
1450.4
1450.6
1450.8
1451.0
1451.1
35
Open perforations, %
Pressure Increase