Publications

Bekapai is a mature oil and gas field located in the offshore Mahakam Delta, Indonesia. The production started in 1974. A field re-development project was initiated in 2008, and further extended in 2014 reaching a stabilized production of 10,000 bopd and 95 MMscfd. The hydrocarbons are accumulated in a complex multilayered reservoir, where oil, gas and different reservoir pressure presence alternately. It’s difficult to maximize the production while optimizing the recovery in such environment since they have to produce in commingles to achieve the production target. Gas-lift is a suitable solution, but gas-lift network installation in offshore environment is delicate, thus the solution has to come from the well itself. Commingle production can result in higher oil production when it’s properly designed. The gas could act as natural gas-lift source to improve the oil outflow. However, this phenomenon cannot entirely be captured by common nodal analysis method since it’s unable to explicitly represent oil and gas reservoirs producing in commingle. In addition to that, it can only estimate the instantaneous production rate thus the long term impact cannot be forecasted properly albeit the possible negative impact on the gas recovery. Numerical simulation is an approach to this issue, but its application to multilayered reservoirs system is complicated. In order to easily capture the complete view of an extensive commingle production in a well, a handy integrated approach has been developed and applied by Bekapai engineers. It consists of reservoir model and productivity, outflow performance and surface network. It allows each item to be placed at its proper location, assignment of different reservoir fluids, and production interference within reservoir. Its main application is well perforation strategy optimization that will impact the instantaneous rate and well production forecast which eventually helps engineer to maximize the production and optimize the recovery.