Researchers Submit Patent Application, "Suppressing Oscillations Due to Pattern Switching in Low Drawdown Wells", for Approval (USPTO 20160078158)
By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Politics & Government Week -- From
Washington, D.C.
, VerticalNews journalists report that a patent application by the inventor
Zapata
,
Vito Joseph (
Houston, TX
), filed on September 15, 2015, was made available online on March 24, 2016.
No assignee for this patent application has been made.
News editors obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: "Operations, such as geophysical surveying, drilling, logging, well completion, and production, may be performed to locate and gather valuable downhole fluids. The subterranean assets are not limited to hydrocarbons such as oil. Throughout this document, the terms 'oilfield' and 'oilfield operation' may be used interchangeably with the terms 'field' and 'field operation' to refer to a site where any type of valuable fluids or minerals can be found and the activities required to extract them. The terms may also refer to sites where substances are deposited or stored by injecting the substances into the surface using boreholes and the operations associated with this process. Further, the term 'field operation' refers to a field operation associated with a field, including activities related to field planning, wellbore drilling, wellbore completion, and/or production using the wellbore.
"One or more aspects of the field operation may be modeled using simulation tools to optimize a parameter of the field operation and/or estimate a result of the field operation. For wells with low drawdowns, oscillations due to flow reversals (pattern switching) seriously affect the computational performance of a numerical reservoir simulator. There is no state-of-the-art approach to solving this problem efficiently. Currently, models involving low drawdown wells, especially in thermal simulations, require user supplied parameters to limit the time step size to mitigate this problem. This technique is effective but computationally expensive and in many cases prohibitive."
As a supplement to the background information on this patent application, VerticalNews correspondents also obtained the inventor's summary information for this patent application: "In general, in one aspect, one or more embodiments relate to performing a field operation in a field. From a simulation engine simulating the field operation, simulation variable values corresponding to grid cells are obtained. The grid cells represent at least a portion of the field for simulating the field operation. The simulation variable values are analyzed to generate a scaling factor and adjusted according to the scaling factor to generate adjusted simulation variable values. The scaling factor controls intermediate result deviation between computation iterations of simulating the field operation. Using the simulation engine, a simulation result is generated based at least on the adjusted simulation variable values. A field operation is performed based on the simulation result.
"Other aspects of the invention will be apparent from the following detailed description and the appended claims.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS
"The appended drawings illustrate several embodiments of suppressing oscillations due to pattern switching in low drawdown wells and are not to be considered limiting of its scope, for suppressing oscillations due to pattern switching in low drawdown wells may admit to other equally effective embodiments.
"FIG. 1.1 is a schematic view, partially in cross-section, of a field in which one or more embodiments of suppressing oscillations due to pattern switching in low drawdown wells may be implemented.
"FIG. 1.2 shows an exploration and production (E&P) computer system in accordance with one or more embodiments.
"FIGS. 2.1 and 2.2 show method flowcharts in accordance with one or more embodiments.
"FIGS. 3.1, 3.2, 3.3, 3.4, 3.5, 3.6, and 3.7 show an example in accordance with one or more embodiments.
"FIG. 4 depicts a computer system using which one or more embodiments of suppressing oscillations due to pattern switching in low drawdown wells may be implemented."
For additional information on this patent application, see:
Zapata
,
Vito Joseph. Suppressing Oscillations Due to Pattern Switching in Low Drawdown Wells. Filed September 15, 2015 and posted March 24, 2016. Patent URL:
http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.html&r=3097&p=62&f=G&l=50&d=PG01&S1=20160317.PD.&OS=PD/20160317&RS=PD/20160317
Keywords for this news article include: Energy, Patents, Oilfield, Oil & Gas.
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