Overview

Welcome to the Production Operations feature once again. Some of the issues that production-operations engineers must address in their daily work include multiphase flow in production systems, well-productivity changes, and production-performance testing and analysis. These issues often are compounded when compositional changes occur in the produced reservoir fluids, as is commonly encountered in the production of gas-condensate reservoirs.

This year’s Production Operations feature includes some very interesting research and some practical applications of the measurement and evaluation of well performance in multiphase-flow operations. There is significant need for a better understanding of the complex phenomena associated with multiphase flow in production systems, including the metering of fluid flow, the effects that multiphase flow and reservoir-fluid-compositional changes have on well productivity, and the overall production-system performance under multiphase-and nonlinear-flow conditions.

With improved multiphase-flow metering and testing, improved wellbore multiphase-flow modeling, and more-realistic well-completion-efficiency evaluation, the production-operations engineer can make better-informed decisions about a well’s performance and its potential for improvement. The articles presented in this issue highlight some of the advances being made to improve the measurement and evaluation of the production performance of wells in oil and gas-condensate reservoirs.

Gas/Condensate Wellbore Modeling Using a Fundamental Approach

Production-Well-Testing Optimization With Multiphase Flowmeters

Effect of Non-Darcy Flow on Well Productivity of a Hydraulically Fractured Gas-Condensate Well

Bob Poe, SPE, Engineering Adviser, Schlumberger Data and Consulting Services, has spent more than 17 years in the well-completions and production-operations business. Most of his career has been spent in well-stimulation de-sign and evaluation, production-performance evaluation, phase behavior, and reservoir simulation. Poe holds BS, ME, and PhD degrees in petroleum engineering from Texas A&M U. He has authored several SPE papers on pro-duction-performance analyses and has served on several SPE meeting organizational committees and a Reprint Series Committee. Poe currently serves on the SPE Editorial Review Committee and the JPT Editorial Committee.

Overview

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