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NEW OIL PRODUCTION TECHNOLOGIES FOR HEAVY OIL AND BITUMENS T.N. Nasr, R. Coates, B. Tremblay, R. Sawatzky and T. Frauenfeld (Alberta Research Council)
Abstract. The capacity of world heavy oil and oil sands has been estimated to be as much as that of the worlds total discovered light and medium crude oils in place. Over 90% of the worlds heavy oil and oil sands are deposited in Canada and Venezuela. Up to 90% of Canadas estimated reserves could be recovered by in-situ operations and 10% by surface mining. As the resources available for conventional crude in Canada continue to decline, further development of heavy oil and oil sands recovery technologies is critical to meeting Canadas present and future energy requirements. Most recently, advances made in directional drilling and measuring while drilling (MWD) technologies have facilitated development of new in-situ production technologies such as Steam Assisted Gravity Drainage (SAGD), combined steam-solvent, solvent vapor extraction (VAPEX), cold production and follow up to cold production processes. These processes have significantly improved well-bore reservoir contact and sweep efficiencies and reduced production costs. This paper provides an overview of recent developments in these technologies. 1. INTRODUCTION Western Canada has large reserves of heavy crude oil and bitumen. However, most of these reserves cannot be produced by conventional recovery methods. Specialized techniques are therefore required to produce these heavy oils. The purpose of this paper is to give an overview of oil recovery technologies applicable to heavy oil and bitumen reservoirs. Recent technology developments at the Alberta Research Council (ARC) have focused on four technologies: thermal, solvent-assisted, cold production and follow up to cold production processes. 2. OIL RECOVERY TECHNOLOGIES The most promising thermal recovery technology is the SAGD process. In this process, two horizontal wells separated by a vertical distance are placed near the bottom of the formation. The top horizontal well is used to inject steam, which rises forming a large steam chamber above the well, and the bottom well is used to collect the produced liquids (formation water, condensate, and oil). The rising steam condenses on the boundary of the chamber, heating and entraining the oil to the production well. The process leads to a high recovery and high oil rate at economic oil-tosteam ratios (OSR). The Underground Test Facility (UTFPhase A) at Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada was constructed in 1985 by the Alberta Oil Sands Technology and Research Authority (AOSTRA) to test the concept of SAGD. The process was tested from December 1987 to mid 1990. The UTF-Phase A project was the first successful field demonstration of the SAGD process. In addition to proving the concept of SAGD, it also provided operational know-how, which is critical to its successful commercial application. Following the success of the UTF Phase A project, 500 m long horizontal wells have been used in subsequent phases to further test the commercial viability of the SAGD process. In addition, a number of field pilots are in progress in other heavy oil reservoirs in western Canada (Alberta and Saskatchewan), and around the world. These pilots tested the use of surface accessed horizontal wells and extended SAGD applications to problem reservoirs. These reservoirs often have lower permeabilities, are deeper, have bottom water transition zones, with initial gas-saturated live oil and top water / gas caps. In Alberta, the success of these pilots has led to a number of commercial SAGD projects that are currently underway. Current developments of the SAGD process at ARC are aimed at improving oil rates, OSR, reducing energy and minimizing water disposal requirements. In addition to SAGD, progress has been made in the development of combined steam-solvent injection processes, a novel approach for combining the benefits of steam and solvents

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in the recovery of heavy oil and bitumen has been undertaken. A newly patented Expanding Solvent-SAGD ES-SAGD process has been successfully field-tested and has resulted in improved oil rates, OSR and lower energy and water requirements as compared to conventional SAGD. The prime solvent assisted process is the VAPEX process. This process is applicable to thick and medium thickness reservoirs. It is less energy intensive than SAGD, but produces at lower rates. VAPEX process has not yet been tested on a field scale. The VAPEX process is a solvent analogue to SAGD. A pair of horizontal wells is drilled through the formation, and a vapour-phase solvent is injected through the upper well. The solvent condenses in the oil and reduces its viscosity. The diluted oil then drains to the lower well where it is produced. Some reservoirs (e.g. Athabasca) contain oil that is immobile at reservoir conditions. In order to use a VAPEX process, the oil must be mobilized to initiate the oil recovery process. To rely on solvent alone would produce an extended startup time. Research is being carried out at ARC that investigates adding heat to the wells. This will speed up the startup, produce solvent refluxing and enhance production rates. The solvent reflux process has an advantage over the VAPEX process because the solvent refluxing is done at the wellbore. Therefore, there is no need for a surface solvent separation and recompression plant. This translates to a significant saving in capital and operating costs. The process can be advantageous in reservoirs that have reactive mineralogy to hot injected fluids. In addition, reservoirs that are too viscous to be produced by a non-thermal VAPEX process may be produced at adequate rates when heat is combined with solvent. Cold production is a primary (nonthermal) recovery process in which sand is produced deliberately along with oil, water and gas. It has been applied with commercial success in heavy oil reservoirs in western Canada, particularly in the area surrounding Lloydminster. The cold production process improves oil production rates substantially through regions of increased permeability wormholes. The process keys on the formation and flow of foamy oil into wormholes, as they grow into the reservoir. The wormholes provide improved access to the reservoir.

In western Canada, cold production has been applied mostly in thin, fairly shallow pays, about 2 m to 10 m thick and about 500 m deep. Key conditions for the process appear to include: a minimum initial gas-oil ratio (GOR); a minimum oil viscosity; mobile oil; and, unconsolidated, clean sands (very low fines content). These conditions are also found in thin, heavy oil reservoirs elsewhere in the world. Currently, few of these reservoirs are being exploited through cold production. The key field issues that need to be considered in applying the cold production process effectively include: pool exploitation strategies, such as step-out patterns and timing, well spacing, and infill locations; prediction of production profiles and reserves; and, well operations, such as the impact of bottom hole pressure and gas production, stimulation of poor producers, and extending well life. Over the past ten years, reservoir engineering tools have been developed at ARC and are being used to address these issues. The tools include operating guidelines based on understanding the key mechanisms in cold production, foamy oil flow and wormhole network growth, and comprehensive, predictive, field scale numerical models of the cold production process that incorporate these mechanisms. The cold production process has become the predominant method for heavy oil production in reservoirs in the area surrounding Lloydminster in western Canada. Ultimate recoveries for this process usually fall within a range of about 8 15% of the initial oil in place, leaving behind significant oil volumes in the reservoir for further exploitation. At the end of the life of a cold production pool, the produced oil has been mainly replaced by free gas that had broken out of the oil as the pressure was depleted. The free gas renders the oil remaining in the reservoir virtually immobile, as a result of the tremendous mobility difference between the two phases. In order to produce more oil from the pool, it is necessary to improve the mobility of some of the remaining oil. Oil mobility could be increased by reducing oil viscosity and by redistributing the oil phase within the reservoir to increase its effective permeability. Several follow up processes have been investigated at ARC for accomplishing this. Thermal-based methods reduce the oil viscosity substantially and expand the oil phase, allowing oil

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redistribution to occur by means of gravity and capillary forces. Solvent-based methods can have the same effect, reducing oil viscosity and swelling the oil phase. In order to produce more mobile oil, a drive must be re-established. There can be inherent conflicts between those mechanisms that improve oil mobility, and mechanisms that drive the oil to the well. For example, the injection of methane does not do much for oil redistribution and viscosity reduction since very little methane can be dissolved in the oil, but could allow a reasonably effective drive to be established. The resulting oil production would be limited due to the lack of increased oil mobility. One approach to this problem is to utilize stimulation methods that blend mechanisms to generate an economically optimum combination of viscosity reduction, redistribution and drive. Recently, some advances in the development of cyclic processes for post cold production pools have been made at ARC using this blended approach.