Papers by Tatenda Marapira
Reserve forecasting using the Arps empirical rate-decline relations has been standard practice in... more Reserve forecasting using the Arps empirical rate-decline relations has been standard practice in the petroleum industry for decades. However, the forecasting of reserves in unconventional reservoirs using the Arps relations is usually challenging and more often than not produces ambiguous results. The low to ultra-low permeability plays that make up unconventional reservoirs display behaviour that runs contrary to the assumptions that underlie the Arps relations. Because of this, when the typically long-term transient flow data is used with the Arps relations, it results in substantial underestimation or overestimation of reserves when the relations are extrapolated unconstrained. To address the shortcomings of the traditional relations, a Modified Hyperbolic Decline Model was introduced that merges a hyperbolic equation with an exponential tail. In this paper the development of this model is analysed and compared with the traditional Arps relations using synthetic data of a tight gas well. After analysing the data, it was concluded that the Modified Hyperbolic Relation presents an alternative that addresses the shortcomings of the traditional Arps relations and also provides for flexibility in the forecast as more data becomes available.
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Papers by Tatenda Marapira