Sensitivity Analysis of Hydraulic Fracturing Parameters for Optimum Horizontal Well Spacing in Tight Oil Reservoirs

• Published in: Arabian journal for science and engineering (2011) 2024-08
• Main Authors: Helmy, Ahmed G., Salem, Said K., Elnoby, Mohsen
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• ISSN: 2193-567X; 2191-4281
• DOI: 10.1007/s13369-024-09311-z

Three-dimensional reservoir simulation models were developed to perform different simulation runs which aim to get an estimate for the optimal well productivity in such unconventional very low permeability reservoirs. It will take into consideration the limitations, uncertainties and capabilities of each parameter like matrix permeability, hydraulic fracturing spacing, half-length, height and conductivity to get an enhanced estimate of the optimal production ultimate recovery by using the uncertainty analysis. Hydraulic fracturing parameters with reservoir data were used to estimate the optimum well spacing distance between the horizontal wells in tight oil reservoirs. The estimated recovery factor and production forecasting using the reservoir simulation with its capabilities to get computational cases with different combinations will get the optimal well count with optimum economic evaluation. Different reservoir modeling scenarios were built with various arrangements of affecting factors. Characterizing hydraulic fracture parameters, such as fracture spacing, fracture height, fracture half-length and fracture conductivity, are studied by setting different ranges per parameter and results were investigated by comparing the oil production rate trends and total cumulative oil production after a ten-year lifetime. Sensitivity analysis was performed on the different hydraulic fracturing parameters by setting different ranges and setting the objective function to be the cumulative oil production. A complete statistical analysis for the results from the simulation runs using response surface analysis including Morris’s method and Sobol method which is a variance-based analysis was carried out. This study sensitivity analyses shed light on the long-term production behavior of tight oil reservoirs. The findings indicate that the most important parameters that influence the performance of such tight reservoirs are those related to fracture half-length and fracture height, fracture conductivity and matrix permeability. A general production trend analysis and comparisons are run for various well spacings with different numbers of wells per 100 acres (40.4687 ha). Because of their quick rates of decline, unconventional reservoirs typically favor high initial rates. Furthermore, drilling and fracturing procedures are expensive. As a result, it is crucial to quantify these fracture parameters using different data to optimize the fracture design for both single and man