CA1281058C - Process for increasing the degree of oil extraction - Google Patents

Process for increasing the degree of oil extraction

Info

Publication number
CA1281058C
CA1281058C CA000524269A CA524269A CA1281058C CA 1281058 C CA1281058 C CA 1281058C CA 000524269 A CA000524269 A CA 000524269A CA 524269 A CA524269 A CA 524269A CA 1281058 C CA1281058 C CA 1281058C
Authority
CA
Canada
Prior art keywords
oil
formations
liquid
process according
reservoir
Prior art date
Legal status (The legal status is an assumption and is not a legal conclusion. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation as to the accuracy of the status listed.)
Expired - Fee Related
Application number
CA000524269A
Other languages
French (fr)
Inventor
Olav Ellingsen
Current Assignee (The listed assignees may be inaccurate. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation or warranty as to the accuracy of the list.)
Industrikontakt Ing O Ellingsen and Co
Original Assignee
Industrikontakt Ing O Ellingsen and Co
Priority date (The priority date is an assumption and is not a legal conclusion. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation as to the accuracy of the date listed.)
Filing date
Publication date
Application filed by Industrikontakt Ing O Ellingsen and Co filed Critical Industrikontakt Ing O Ellingsen and Co
Application granted granted Critical
Publication of CA1281058C publication Critical patent/CA1281058C/en
Anticipated expiration legal-status Critical
Expired - Fee Related legal-status Critical Current

Links

Classifications

    • EFIXED CONSTRUCTIONS
    • E21EARTH DRILLING; MINING
    • E21BEARTH DRILLING, e.g. DEEP DRILLING; OBTAINING OIL, GAS, WATER, SOLUBLE OR MELTABLE MATERIALS OR A SLURRY OF MINERALS FROM WELLS
    • E21B43/00Methods or apparatus for obtaining oil, gas, water, soluble or meltable materials or a slurry of minerals from wells
    • E21B43/16Enhanced recovery methods for obtaining hydrocarbons
    • E21B43/24Enhanced recovery methods for obtaining hydrocarbons using heat, e.g. steam injection
    • E21B43/2401Enhanced recovery methods for obtaining hydrocarbons using heat, e.g. steam injection by means of electricity
    • EFIXED CONSTRUCTIONS
    • E21EARTH DRILLING; MINING
    • E21BEARTH DRILLING, e.g. DEEP DRILLING; OBTAINING OIL, GAS, WATER, SOLUBLE OR MELTABLE MATERIALS OR A SLURRY OF MINERALS FROM WELLS
    • E21B43/00Methods or apparatus for obtaining oil, gas, water, soluble or meltable materials or a slurry of minerals from wells
    • E21B43/003Vibrating earth formations

Abstract

A process for increasing the degree of oil extraction.
Abstract A process for increasing the degree of extraction of oil or other volatile liquids in oil reservoirs on land or at sea, by making the formations in said reservoir vibrate as close to the natural frequency of said formations as possible, so that the binding forces between formations and oil are de-graded and oil is, thus, more easily recovered from the form-ations. Furthermore, the pressure in said reservoir is main-tained by evaporating some oil and water in the reservoir, due to the fact that heating is achieved both as a consequence of said vibrations, and by the aid of electrical high frequency pulses causing the reservoir to perform like an electrode furnace.

Description

~ X8~

_ A process for increasing the degree of oil extraction The present invention relates to a process for increasing the degree of extraction for oil or other volatile liquids in oil reservoirs on land or at sea by the aid of vibrations and heat by the aid of electrical high-frequency pulsesO

In connection with recovery of oil from any oil field only part of the oil present can be recovered. 'rhe degree of re-covery can vary from approximately 17% and up to approximately 50%. The degree of recovery from the EKOFISK field is, e.g.
estimated at approximately 20%.

The cause oE -the fact that it is not possible to recover all oil from a field, or at least a larger por-tion o~ such oil, is involved with the manner in which oil is bound in the ~ormat-ions. Oil in the pores of the formations is bound to said form-ations by capillary forces, surface tensions, polar forces, and adhesive forcesO At the beginning of oil production said 20 binding energy will be overcome by the natural pressure pre-vailing in said oil reservoirs, but as this pressure gradually decreases said forces will exceed the expelling pressure, resulting in a decreased oil produc-tion even though most of the oil is left in the formations.

Considerable effort was made over the years and is still made to increase the degree of recovery, and the best known approach is to inject water into the reservoires. Additionally, a series of chemicals was developed, all of them more or less intended for breaking up the adhesion forces between oil and formations. Besides being very expensive the known methods only contribute very little to increase the degree of recovery.
E.g., the above mentioned degree of recovery is calculated after injection of water into -the reservoir. Without such in-jection the degree of recovery is calculated to be approxima-te-ly 17%.

Apart from the fact that a relatively small lncrease of the . ~

.. . .

~8~

_ degree of recovery ls achieved, water injection requires ex-tensive control of injection wells. This is associated with the so called "finger problem" arising when water penetrates.
The water front moving in the oil field will not appear as a sharp front, but rather like a front with extended "fingers", due to the fact that water will always seek to find the line of leas~ resistance in the formation. This may be compared with observations made when water is spurted onto a mound of gravel. You will soon observe that the water digs depressions 10 where water can pass. The hazard of water injection is that such a "finger" reaches the production well. In that case only water will be produced frorn the injection. In order to over-come these problems much work is done to develop very sofist-icated computer models of these so called front movements in order to permit control of both volume and pressure of water to prevent break-through to production wells.

A natural manner of increasing the degree of recovery would be to overcome the above mentioned binding forces wi-th an in-20 crease of the pressure~within the formations, and not with apressure fron-t of water or another expelling medium.

It is an object of the present invention to disclose a process for achieving this aim on the basis of comprehension of the 25 binding forces acting in a typical oil reservoir.

The process should state the necessary elements for achieving the intended effect and the technique used to this end.

30 From physics it is known that the frictional force between bodies will decrease dramatically if one body is rapid~y moved normally to the direction of movement of the other body. This fact is, inter alia, used when certain instruments are Support-ed, i.e. a marker of an instrument for detecting some physical 35 change is moun-ted on a slide bearing on a round rod. When said rod is rotated the frictional force between said bearing and rod will be approximately 0. The same effect may, indeed, be observed when we hit the cover of, e.g. an oil drum, if there .
''- ~, ' ' ' ' ~ ' ' - ' ' ' . ' ' ' ' ' s~

_ is a little sand and water on said cover. Both sand and water will "float" on the cover like small drops, and there is only a minimum force needed to blow the drops away.

The first part of the process has the objec-t of establishing vibrations of an oil reservoir to achieve the same effect of the oil trapped in the formations. -So long as there is a natural pressure in the reservoir this will be enough to squeeze out considerably more oil than from a reservoir "in piece and quiet". Even though a considerably lower pressure is necessary to recover more oil from the field, ~-sooner or later, there will be a limit of how much oil you can recover from the field. When the natural pressure disappears there are two conceivable manners of recovering oil - pumping by sucktion, which is e.g. used in socalled "nodding pumps"
and/or creating a new pressure inside the reservoir.

Since -there is still a considerable volume of oil remaining in the reservoir it represents a liquid which could, by evaporation, create the necessary internal pressure to in-crease the degree of recovery.

It is suggested that such evaporation of -the oil may be achieved by heating the field by the aid of elec-trical high-frequency currents passing between the different wells that are commonly drilled from a production rig. Since there is always a little brine in an oil field and/or such brine can be supplied by injection and to the extend water break-through is achieved between the separate well_ an electroconductive medium will be obtained which will act as an electrode furnace when electric energy is supplied. The resulting energy will cause evaporation of oil/water and will, thus, increase the pressure so -that more oil can be recovered.

The process is now explained in more detail with reference to the drawing:

. ~

_ Figure l shows a sectional view of an oil reservoir where several wells a have been drilled. Into the lower portion of the well, where oil recovery takes place, mercury b or another heavy electroconductive liquid was poured. The function of said liquid is both to conduct vibrations to ~he surrounding formations c, to conduc-t electric current from one well to another, and also to ~flash~ out oil/water, and possibly mud produced below liquid level d.

A high-frequency vibrator is via a cable e provided in liquid b and is supplied with energy from the surEace by a high-frequency convertor which is, in turn supplied with energy from a generator h. This energy is conducted down to said vibrator by conductors in the center of cable e. Said conduct-ors are surrounded by an insulator ~ onto which a conductor kis wound which is connected in an elec-troconductive manner to the surface l of said vibrator.

Conductor k receives energy from a high-frequency convertor n 20 which, in turn, receives its energy from a generator o. Said generator and frequency convertor can supply both single phase and polyphase current. In case of single phase curred each phase goes to a well and in case of three-phase current 3 wells are connected to phases R, S, T.

Electric current may also be conducted down to -the well through pipes s made from steel or another electroconductive material conventionally used for well liners. In this case only con-ductors for supplying energy to the vibrator itself by the 30 aid of conductor i are required. Liquid b, also, does not have to be electroconductive in this case.

Figure 2 shows an enlarged view of the lower portion of two wells p with an auxiliary well q, and an illustration of a 35 break-through o-E water r.

When said vibrator receives energy it will oscillate the mercury b with vibrations adapted to the natural frequency of 8~

_ the formations, i-t will cause resonant vibrations in said form-ations which vibrations will propagate outwards and will, literally shake off the oil from the formations. The energy from vibrations will also supply the formations with heat as 5 frictional heat between separate particles of the formation and between the formations and the oil flowing out, and it will contribute to maintaining the pressure by evaporating some oil and water.

10 When energy is supplied to the surface of vibrators it will be conducted outwards to the surrounding formations through the mercury and it will propagate further outwards in the field to next pair of poles in the next well. The same will happen if the current is conducted down into the well through the liners.
Conductivity will increase if there is a break-through of water and this will, in fact, contribute to increase the development of heat in the formations. If the formations are such that i-t is impossible to achieve electrical contact between two product-ion wells p so called auxiliary wells may be drilled in which 20 the same kind of vibrators/electric conductors are provided.

Figure 3 shows a sectional view of three wells indicating how vibrations t and the electric field u propagate between wells.

- 25 Figure ~ is a sectional view of two wells indicating the "finger problem" that may arise when water is injected.

Figure 5 shows a section of a well illustrating an arrangement comprising two vibrators and indicating the waves of vibration 30 and the field lines from the electric voltage going down into the mercury.

.

Claims (7)

1. A process for increasing the degree of extraction of oil or other volatile liquid from an oil reservoir in which there are well bores (a), which comprises filling of a well bore (a) with a metallic liquid (b) in a vertical region corresponding to formations (c) in the reservoir that hold liquid to be extracted;
vibrating the metallic liquid (b) with a vibrator inserted into the liquid (b) so that it oscillates with vibrations adapted to the natural frequency of the formations (c) whereby the formations are caused to vibrate and thereby the binding forces of the liquid to be recovered are reduced; and causing the formations (c) to be heated; characterised in that there are a plurality of said well bores (a) containing metallic liquid (b) and there are electric conductors (e) leading to the metallic liquid; and in that the formations are heated by the passage of alternating electric current between electrodes in different wells (a), the heating effect urging evaporation of oil/water in the formations, thus producing pressure which increases extracttion.
2. Process according to claim 1, the metallic liquid (b) being mercury.
3, Process according to claim 1, more than one vibrator being used in the said well bore (a).
4. Process according to claim 2, more than one vibrator being used in the said well bore (a).
5. Process according to any one of claims 1 to 4 the electric current being supplied to the metallic liquid acting as an electrode.
6. Process according to any one of claims 1 to 4, the electric current being supplied to the metallic liquid acting as an electrode and wherein there are three well bores (a) containing electrodes and each is fed one phase of a 3-phase A.C. supply.
7. Process according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein there are three well bores (a) containing electrodes and each is fed one phase of a 3-phase A.C. supply.
CA000524269A 1985-12-03 1986-12-02 Process for increasing the degree of oil extraction Expired - Fee Related CA1281058C (en)

Applications Claiming Priority (2)

Application Number Priority Date Filing Date Title
NO854852A NO161697C (en) 1985-12-03 1985-12-03 PROCEDURE FOR INCREASING THE EXTRACTION RATE OF OIL OTHER VOLATILE LIQUIDS FROM OIL RESERVES.
NO854852 1985-12-03

Publications (1)

Publication Number Publication Date
CA1281058C true CA1281058C (en) 1991-03-05

Family

ID=19888615

Family Applications (1)

Application Number Title Priority Date Filing Date
CA000524269A Expired - Fee Related CA1281058C (en) 1985-12-03 1986-12-02 Process for increasing the degree of oil extraction

Country Status (21)

Country Link
US (1) US4884634A (en)
EP (1) EP0249609B1 (en)
JP (1) JPS63502195A (en)
CN (1) CN1009672B (en)
AR (1) AR243966A1 (en)
AU (1) AU594402B2 (en)
BR (1) BR8607011A (en)
CA (1) CA1281058C (en)
DE (1) DE3682902D1 (en)
DZ (1) DZ1012A1 (en)
EG (1) EG17669A (en)
IL (1) IL80854A (en)
IN (1) IN164735B (en)
MX (1) MX170511B (en)
MY (1) MY100625A (en)
NO (1) NO161697C (en)
NZ (1) NZ218496A (en)
RU (1) RU1838594C (en)
TR (1) TR23787A (en)
UA (1) UA15919A1 (en)
WO (1) WO1987003643A1 (en)

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RU2063507C1 (en) * 1992-12-28 1996-07-10 Акционерное общество закрытого типа "Биотехинвест" Method for gas production from a seam with a trap
US5460223A (en) * 1994-08-08 1995-10-24 Economides; Michael J. Method and system for oil recovery
US6427774B2 (en) 2000-02-09 2002-08-06 Conoco Inc. Process and apparatus for coupled electromagnetic and acoustic stimulation of crude oil reservoirs using pulsed power electrohydraulic and electromagnetic discharge
US6227293B1 (en) 2000-02-09 2001-05-08 Conoco Inc. Process and apparatus for coupled electromagnetic and acoustic stimulation of crude oil reservoirs using pulsed power electrohydraulic and electromagnetic discharge
US6619394B2 (en) 2000-12-07 2003-09-16 Halliburton Energy Services, Inc. Method and apparatus for treating a wellbore with vibratory waves to remove particles therefrom
JP4662232B2 (en) * 2003-11-10 2011-03-30 鹿島建設株式会社 Gas hydrate production method and system
US7059413B2 (en) * 2004-03-19 2006-06-13 Klamath Falls, Inc. Method for intensification of high-viscosity oil production and apparatus for its implementation
US8113278B2 (en) 2008-02-11 2012-02-14 Hydroacoustics Inc. System and method for enhanced oil recovery using an in-situ seismic energy generator
US20090283257A1 (en) * 2008-05-18 2009-11-19 Bj Services Company Radio and microwave treatment of oil wells
EA017335B1 (en) * 2009-09-18 2012-11-30 Анатолий Яковлевич КАРТЕЛЕВ Method of powering of electrodeischarge well devices
US8230934B2 (en) 2009-10-02 2012-07-31 Baker Hughes Incorporated Apparatus and method for directionally disposing a flexible member in a pressurized conduit
US8646527B2 (en) * 2010-09-20 2014-02-11 Harris Corporation Radio frequency enhanced steam assisted gravity drainage method for recovery of hydrocarbons
RU2450119C1 (en) * 2010-11-10 2012-05-10 Общество с ограниченной ответственностью "СоНовита" (ООО "СоНовита") Equipment complex for production of high-viscosity oil
US8839856B2 (en) 2011-04-15 2014-09-23 Baker Hughes Incorporated Electromagnetic wave treatment method and promoter
WO2016167666A1 (en) 2015-04-15 2016-10-20 Resonator As Improved oil recovery by pressure pulses
US20160341022A1 (en) * 2015-05-19 2016-11-24 Shell Oil Company Method of treating a subterranean formation with a mortar slurry designed to form a permeable mortar
RU2631451C1 (en) * 2016-07-29 2017-09-22 федеральное государственное автономное образовательное учреждение высшего образования "Национальный исследовательский ядерный университет МИФИ" (НИЯУ МИФИ) Method to increase oil recovery of formation with high viscosity oil
CN107605472B (en) * 2017-08-10 2021-11-02 中国石油天然气股份有限公司 Method and device for determining oil reservoir recovery ratio
AR124801A1 (en) * 2021-02-03 2023-05-03 Ypf Tecnologia Sa CRUDE OIL RECOVERY METHOD BY IMPRESED CURRENT

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Also Published As

Publication number Publication date
NO161697B (en) 1989-06-05
NZ218496A (en) 1989-05-29
BR8607011A (en) 1987-12-01
UA15919A1 (en) 1997-06-30
RU1838594C (en) 1993-08-30
JPH0443560B2 (en) 1992-07-16
MX170511B (en) 1993-08-27
DZ1012A1 (en) 2004-09-13
AR243966A1 (en) 1993-09-30
US4884634A (en) 1989-12-05
NO854852L (en) 1987-06-04
CN86108326A (en) 1987-07-01
IN164735B (en) 1989-05-20
IL80854A (en) 1990-11-05
AU594402B2 (en) 1990-03-08
IL80854A0 (en) 1987-03-31
MY100625A (en) 1990-12-29
JPS63502195A (en) 1988-08-25
AU6629786A (en) 1987-06-30
DE3682902D1 (en) 1992-01-23
TR23787A (en) 1990-09-13
NO161697C (en) 1989-09-13
EG17669A (en) 1990-08-30
EP0249609A1 (en) 1987-12-23
EP0249609B1 (en) 1991-12-11
CN1009672B (en) 1990-09-19
WO1987003643A1 (en) 1987-06-18

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