The US Department of Energy added two more projects to its program to develop technologies to increase natural gas production from low-permeability reservoirs. The agency selected 20 other projects for the program last August (OGJ Online, Aug. 15, 2001). Both of the new projects focus on the challenges of excess water production.
Advanced Resources International, Arlington, Va., wants to research and address water-production dilemmas of gas fields in the Rocky Mountains, where mobile water and high water production is becoming more of a problem. Affected areas include the Piceance basin in western Colorado, the Greater Green River basin in southwest Wyoming, and the Wind River basin in central Wyoming.
Advanced Resources will: build a regional database on water composition and chemistry for key Rocky Mountain gas basins; identify sources and waterways in close proximity to natural gas formations; and verify regional water storage, flow models, and field tests to avoid or mitigate high water production. The effort is aimed at the major northern Rocky Mountain gas basins, with emphasis on the Green River and Wind River basins of Wyoming and the Waltman-Cave Gulch field on the eastern side of the Wind River basin.
DOE will pay nearly $500,000 of the $678,316 cost of the 27-month project.
Cementing Solutions Inc., Houston, will examine aspects of creating good zone isolation to increase gas production from low-permeability reservoirs.
Experimental results and mathematical modeling will be fed into a computer-based, best-practice decision matrix, which will permit gas producers to evaluate the best types of cements, properties and placement methods to maximize gas stimulation and minimize formation damage.
Focusing primarily on the Ardmore basin in south-central Oklahoma, the project will identify other basins that may benefit from the findings.
