Exploiting science to increase oil recovery 2 - What is natural production

what is natural production and how is it prevented from slowing natural production is the amount of oil recovered when a reservoir is first drilled deeply buried reservoirs trap gas oil and water under very high pressure reservoirs are typically connected to the surface over great distances via aquifers as water is more dense than oil it exerts a greater pressure than an equivalent column of oil so when it is first put on production the pressure in the reservoir is greater than at the base of the oil well this way the fluids are naturally pushed to the surface but over time the reservoir pressure drops until finally it is the same as the pressure at the bottom of the well when that happens the Wells stops flowing typically natural production accounts for about 10 percent of the original oil in place because of that the industry has developed ways to maintain reservoir pressure and push out more of the oil water is injected to replace the produced fluids and maintain reservoir pressure alternatively produced gas is reinjected to maintain reservoir pressure but these methods can still only produce around 35 percent of the initial oil in place the remaining 65% stays trapped in the reservoir so what causes oil recovery to be so low

Channel: bp

Views: 12,938

Keywords: science, oil, water, gas, BP

Id: talrM1kN3uY

Length: 2min 0sec (120 seconds)

Published: Wed May 07 2014