Advanced reservoir and hydraulic fracture characterization of unconventional light oil reservoirs

It is expected that successful development of unconventional light oil (ULO) reservoirs will allow for significant growth in oil production in Western Canada, reversing a trend in recent history of declining conventional oil production. New technology, such as multi-fractured horizontal wells (MFHWs), has enabled commercial production from some of Western Canada's ULO plays. There remain, however, significant challenges to the optimal development of these plays related to the poor understanding of fluid storage and transport mechanisms and their controls. The proposed integrated research program will be directed at improving reservoir and hydraulic fracture characterization methods for Western Canadian ULO plays. Reservoir sample analysis will be used to obtain key properties controlling fluid flow and establish both organic and inorganic matter controls on these properties. This information will be used along with well-log data to "scale-up" to the well-scale through population of petrophysical models. These petrophysical models will in turn be used to populate 1) new well-test analysis tools used to obtain in-situ estimates of reservoir properties; 2) new hydraulic fracture models that will then be used in predicting production and injection-well hydraulic fracture properties 3) new rate-transient analysis (RTA) models for hydraulic fracture and reservoir characterization 4) 3D geologic models to be used in reservoir simulation of primary- and enhanced-recovery processes in ULO and 5) analytical reservoir connectivity studies to assess large-scale fluid flow and simplify analysis of primary recovery and EOR projects. The study integrates analyses of pore-scale along with core-scale and well/field scale processes and will be carried out by the principal investigators and their geoscience and petroleum engineering students. The novel aspects of this study include 1) application of new methods for characterizing ULO pore-structure and flow characteristics, hydraulic fracture properties and reservoir connectivity and 2) integration of these multiscale and multidisciplinary techniques to improve reservoir characterization.