News DOE assists independents' oil recovery

The U.S. Department of Energy has let contracts to eight independent producers so they can apply technologies to improve oil and gas production. DOE plans grants to other producers in coming months. The department, working through the National Institute for Petroleum & Energy Research (Niper) in Bartles- ville, Okla., is providing nearly $400,000. Producers and their project partners will provide more than $500,000 in funds and other contributions. The DOE program is directed at companies with

Feb. 12, 1996

7 min read

The U.S. Department of Energy has let contracts to eight independent producers so they can apply technologies to improve oil and gas production.

DOE plans grants to other producers in coming months.

The department, working through the National Institute for Petroleum & Energy Research (Niper) in Bartles- ville, Okla., is providing nearly $400,000. Producers and their project partners will provide more than $500,000 in funds and other contributions.

The DOE program is directed at companies with less than 50 employees or contractors that have no affiliation with a major oil company.

DOE spelled out the reason for its program: "Independent producers account for nearly 40% of the nation's domestic oil supply, but virtually none of these companies has the technical capability or resources to try untried or unfamiliar technological approaches that potentially could improve their economic viability.

"As a result, with oil prices remaining low, many of these companies are on the verge of abandoning much of the nation's remaining oil resource.

"Without federal assistance, technologies and techniques tried in the projects would be beyond the capabilities of smaller companies. In many cases, the technical approaches may be unfamiliar to producers or too novel and unproven to warrant the investment of scarce dollars.

"By providing a small amount of federal cost-sharing-$50,000 or less per project-DOE is encouraging producers to experiment with higher-risk approaches that could mean the difference between maintaining production from an oil field or shutting it in."

Technology transfer

The eight companies and others in the future will be the focus of a technology transfer campaign to be conducted by DOE and BDM-Oklahoma, Niper operator. Techniques and results from the trial projects will be disseminated to other small producers through workshops, technical reports, and DOE and industry electronic networks.

The effort, which differs from the larger Reservoir Class Field Demonstration Program it began in 1992, is under way in 14 states.

Those full scale field tests mostly demonstrate techniques to maintain production from fields threatened by near term abandonment. The smaller effort pinpoints specific production problems and attempts to demonstrate lower cost remedies, often focusing on an individual well or group of wells.

DOE's technical assistance program remains open for independent producers to submit proposals. It has received 37 proposals since last March and is accepting more proposals. DOE has $240,000 in remaining funds set aside for the effort.

Latest projects

In the eight latest awards:

Cobra Oil & Gas Corp., Wichita Falls, Tex., working through the Geological Survey of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, Ala., will develop a detailed model of the rock strata that make up the upper Jurassic Frisco City sandstone reservoirs along a trend in South Alabama, mainly in Monroe County.
DOE said there are eight oil fields in the South Alabama trend, but a detailed regional stratigraphic model has never been prepared. With it, producers will have a better picture of where oil bearing zones and geologic faults occur, enabling better well locations.
About 20 whole cores, well logs, and other geologic and engineering data will be correlated with Fullbore Formation MicroImager logs and integrated into a regional reservoir stratigraphic model.
DOE is providing $50,000 with industry cost sharing totaling $50,000 for the 12-month effort. Schlumberger Well Services will be part of the project team.
Speir Operating Co., Albion, Ill., will use microbes to try to solve severe pipe corrosion problems in an oil field near Albion.
DOE said the corrosion is due to sulfides and other impurities formed from the action of bacteria carried by water injected into the formation for many years. The bacteria convert sulfur in iron pyrite, found in many reservoir rocks, into a corrosive impurity that attacks metal pipe.
Speir will repair, swab, and acidize damaged pipe to remove scale, then inject microbes that are tailored to "feed" on the sulfides and other corrosive substances.
DOE is providing $48,775 for the 12 month project. Speir will match that sum.
Diamond Exploration Inc., Paola, Kan., will use an electrical heating technique in Paola-Rantoul-Shoestring field to thin heavy oil that otherwise would be too viscous to produce.
DOE said Diamond will connect a patterned layout of electrical probes to a power generator on the surface. Electrical currents induced in the 200 ft deep reservoir will heat oil and water in the formation, raising the temperature of the oil. If the temperature is not raised sufficiently, Diamond will also inject nitrogen and carbon dioxide to increase formation pressure and force the heated oil to producing wells.
DOE and Diamond each earmarked $49,500 for the 6 month project.
Kenneth Y. Park, Skiatook, Okla., will return five shut-in wells to production in an Oklahoma field, using gel-like polymers to block areas of the formation that have been swept by waterflooding.
Park will acidize the shut-in wells, then inject polymers into the formation.
The water flow will carry the polymers to areas of the reservoir that are no longer productive, where they will gel and block the pathways that are no longer productive. Then injected water will be diverted to other areas of the reservoir where it can sweep additional oil to producing wells.
DOE and Park will provide $45,775 each for the 12 month project.
Keener Oil & Gas Co., Tulsa, will test "electrotelluric surveying," a technique designed to define subsurface geologic features and predict the location of oil bearing rocks.
Electrotelluric surveying, also called magnetotelluric surveying, was developed for the mining industry. It uses surface techniques to measure naturally occurring electrical and magnetic fields, detecting anomalies caused by variations in the hydrocarbon content of subsurface formations.
Using the surveying technique and other methods, Keener has located a subsurface anomaly in Creek County, Okla. It will drill a well to test the accuracy of the electrotelluric signals to locate and define a potential oil bearing structure.
DOE will provide $50,000 for the 6 month project, while Keener will contribute $141,000.
Grace Petroleum Co., Dewey, Okla., will conduct a project similar to the Park project in its use of polymer gels to divert waterflooding to potentially more productive areas of an oil bearing formation. The test will take place in the Bartlesville sand near Dewey.
DOE said the formation derives its reservoir energy from dissolved gas, but production over the years has reduced the drive.
Waterflooding swept through the least resistant pathways in the reservoir, leaving behind oil that has not been contacted by the water flow. Grace will inject polymers into the reservoir to create gels that will block the depleted pathways and divert the water to untouched areas of the formation.
DOE is providing $50,000 for the 18 month effort with Grace providing $56,000.
Dakota Oil Producers Inc., Pierre, S.D., will apply a "huff and puff" technique along with foam flooding to boost production from a South Dakota oil field.
Huff and puff uses a single well for injection of oil freeing substances and later recovery of oil. The technique was developed for steam injection into heavy oil fields and later used with carbon dioxide injection.
Dakota Oil Producers will use it to inject surfactants, water, and an inert gas into an oil well, letting the fluids move out from the well bore into the formation. After the fluids have soaked into the reservoir, the same well will produce oil that has been mobilized by the treatment.
Dakota also will test a technique in which foam and inert gas will be injected into three wells to push oil to surrounding production wells.
DOE will fund $47,202, and Dakota Oil Producers will spend $50,798 for the 6 month project.
Sandia Operating Co., San Antonio, will test a "low invasion" coring system designed to provide more accurate information on the oil content of core samples brought up from prospective oil bearing formations. The test will take place in an Eocene sandstone in Southeast Texas.
DOE said the accuracy of traditional coring techniques is often lessened because the coring process changes the characteristics of the sample.

Sandia will test a "hydrolift, low invasion" coring system that yields a core sample much more representative of the reservoir rock. In the project, core samples produced by the system will be analyzed for their porosity, permeability, oil saturation, wettability, mineralogy, and other characteristics. The data will be correlated with electric logs run in the well.

DOE will provide $50,000 for the 12 month project, with Sandia contributing $70,800.