Downhole Fluid Separator for Multilateral Well Water Cut Reduction
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Solution Overview
Problem
Oil and gas wells experience increasing water production, leading to reduced oil recovery and high disposal costs, as the water cut exceeds the oil production percentage, making it economically challenging to maintain well productivity.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a multilateral well system with a downhole fluid separator at the junction between the main bore and the lateral well, allowing for the separation of formation fluids into production and nonproduction fluids, with the nonproduction fluid being injected back into the subsurface formation.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If conventional single-bore wells are used, then drilling and completion costs are lower, but water cut increases and oil recovery decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The wellbore is divided into multiple lateral bores (first lateral bore, second lateral bore, etc.) extending from a main bore at different angles. Each lateral bore intersects the productive zone at different locations, allowing segmented fluid extraction from different zones. This segmentation enables better control over water and oil production from each zone, reducing overall water cut while maintaining oil recovery.
2Productivity
If multilateral well system is implemented, then productivity and intersection length with productive zone increase, but device complexity and disposal costs increase
Solution Approach 1:
Multiple lateral bores are merged into a single multilateral well system sharing a common main bore and surface infrastructure. The lateral bores converge at the main bore, allowing fluids from multiple zones to be combined and transported through a single production string to the surface. This merging reduces surface facility complexity and consolidation costs while maintaining extended intersection length with the productive zone.
3Ease of operation
If water is pumped to surface for separation, then separation can be performed, but energy consumption and disposal costs increase
Solution Approach 1:
Fluid separation is performed downhole at the junction of the main bore and lateral bores, before the fluids are pumped to the surface. The separator divides the produced fluids into a first fluid (oil-rich) and a second fluid (water-rich) at downhole conditions. This preliminary separation eliminates the need to pump large volumes of water to the surface, significantly reducing energy consumption for water lifting while ensuring proper fluid separation occurs.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This approach increases the value of produced fluids by reducing the water cut, decreases disposal costs, and enhances oil recovery by allowing for the reuse of injected water, thereby improving the overall efficiency and economics of well operations.
Implementation Method 1
the fluid separator is configured to separate the formation fluid into production fluid and nonproduction fluid
Data Source
AI summary
A multilateral well system comprises a fluid separator to be positioned at a junction between a main bore and a lateral well of a multilateral well, wherein the fluid separator is configured to receive a formation fluid and to separate the formation fluid into production fluid and nonproduction fluid. The multilateral well system includes a pump to be positioned at the junction and configured to pump the nonproduction fluid to the lateral well for injection of the nonproduction fluid into a subsurface formation surrounding the at least one lateral well. The multilateral well system includes a first flow channel configured to be a conduit for delivery of the production fluid to the surface of the multilateral well and a second flow channel configured to deliver an injection of a surface fluid from the surface of the multilateral well into an injection zone downhole in the multilateral well.