Casing Design and Analysis for Heavy Oil Wells
Heavy oil recovery uses primary or thermal production technologies. The primary production method often involves continuous sand production to maximize fluid rates. The thermal processes usually consist of some variation of Cyclic Steam Stimulation (CSS) or Steam Assisted Gravity Drainage (SAGD). Heavy oil production poses serious challenges to well casing designs. In addition to the installation loads such as hanging/buoyancy forces and well curvature effect, a casing must support the thermal strains due to the temperature change and formation movements induced by well production. In many field operations, the thermal loading and formation movements can cause large casing strains in excess of the elastic limit. Therefore, a strain-based concept should be used for casing design in order to utilize the allowable strain capacity beyond the yield. The allowable strain design limit is defined by many studies as the strain required to cause structural failure of casing connections. This paper presents a strain-based casing design concept and its application to heavy oil recovery wells. Casing strains due to various loading scenarios are calculated using the proposed finite element models including a casing-formation interaction model for analyzing casing deformations resulting from reservoir compaction and formation shear movement. Design examples are presented to demonstrate the casing design approaches for primary and thermal production wells.
J. XIE
C-FER Technologies, Canada
国际会议
首届世界重油大会(The Technical Sessions of the First World Heavy Oil Conference)
北京
英文
572-580
2006-11-12（万方平台首次上网日期，不代表论文的发表时间）