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Effect of Slot Width and Density on Slotted Liner Performance in SAGD Operations
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- Author(s) / Creator(s)
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Sand production from a poorly consolidated reservoir could give rise to some severe
problems during production. Holding the load bearing solids in place is the main goal of any sand
control technique. The only sand control techniques that have found applications in steam assisted
gravity drainage (SAGD) are some of the mechanical methods, including wire wrapped screens,
slotted liners and more recently, punched screens. Slotted liner is one of the most effective mechanical
sand control methods in the unconsolidated reservoir exploitation, which has proven to be the
preferred sand control method in the SAGD operations. The main advantage of the slotted liners that
makes them suitable for SAGD operations is their superior mechanical integrity for the completion of
long horizontal wells. This study is an attempt to increase the existing understanding of the fines
migration, sand production, and plugging tendency for slotted liners by using a novel large-scale
scaled completion test (SCT) facility. A triaxial cell assembly was used to load sand-packs with
specified and controlled grain size distribution, shape and mineralogy, on multi-slot sand control
coupons. Different stress levels were applied parallel and perpendicular to different combinations of
slot width and density in multi-slot coupons, while brine was injected from the top of the sand-pack
towards the coupon. At each stress level, the mass of produced sand was measured, and the pressure
drops along the sand-pack and coupon were recorded. Fines migration was also investigated by
measuring fines/clay concentration along the sand-pack. The current study employed multi-slot
coupons to investigate flow interactions among slots and its effect on the flow performance of liner
under typically encountered stresses in SAGD wells. According to the experimental observations,
increasing slot width generally reduces the possibility of pore plugging caused by fines migration.
However, there is a limit for slot aperture beyond which the plugging is not reduced any further,
and only a higher level of sanding occurs. Test measurements also indicated that besides the slot
width, the slot density also influences the level of plugging and sand production and must be included
in the design criteria. -
- Date created
- 2020-01-01
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- Subjects / Keywords
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- Type of Item
- Article (Published)