A Dynamic Workflow of Back Pressure Reduction Leading to Well Uptime Maximization

Abstract Objectives/Scope Field XX is a brown field that has suffered from a high pressure sealine system for decades limiting the productivity of oil producers. A multi-disciplinary task force was established with the primary objective of innovating solutions to reduce the sealine pressure and benchmark these solutions versus potential production gain and economic feasibility. Methods, Procedures, Process The main challenge that was encountered to reduce the high sealine pressure includes the identification of the root causes As a result, a multi-disciplinary taskforce was developed in which five projects were identified to reduce the back pressure including acceleration of a 24″ between production complexes, offloading production from one complex to another, utilizing wellhead compression solutions, radial pressure reduction through inlet control valve design, and introduction of drag reducing agents. Each of these aspects was validated through nodal analysis, a coupling model, and the dynamic simulation model combined with the economic friendliness of each item. Results, Observations, Conclusions A multi-disciplinary task force used brainstorming and innovative workflows to verify five opportunities for reducing back pressure impact. The assessment to evaluate and verify the added value of each opportunity includes: Novel/Additive Information This paper is a clear demonstration of collaborative expertise demonstrating innovative mentalities and collectively identifying innovative solutions to a historic production bottleneck. The utilization of subsurface and surface combined solutions has proven to be extraordinarily successful in unlocking hidden barrels of oil with minimum investment requirements. The contents of this paper can be cascaded to multiple brown fields on a global scale to enhance production in an immediate time frame without jeopardizing reservoir health.