A Semianalytical Approach for Production of Oil from Bottom Water Drive Tight Oil Reservoirs with Complex Hydraulic Fractures

Abstract

In order to improve the recovery rate, fractured horizontal wells are widely used in tight reservoirs. In general, a complex fracture system is generated in tight reservoirs to improve oil production. Based on the fractal theory, a semianalytical model is presented to simulate a complex fracture system by using the volumetric source method and superposition principle, and the solutions are determined iteratively. The reliability of this model is validated through numerical simulation (Eclipse 2011); it shows that the result from this method is identical with that from the numerical simulation. The study on influence factors of this model was focused on matrix permeability, fractal dimension, and half-length of main fracture. The results show that (1) the production increases with the increase of half-length of main fracture and matrix permeability during the initial production stage, but the production difference becomes smaller in different half-length of main fractures and matrix permeability in middle and later stages and (2) the cumulative production increases with the increase of fractal dimension, and the increments of cumulative production in different fractal dimensions gradually increase during the initial production stage, but the increments tend to be stable in middle and later stages. This study can be used for forecasting the oil production from bottom water tight oil reservoirs with complex hydraulic fractures. It can also guide in optimization of horizontal well fracturing design to improve oil production and oil recovery in bottom water tight oil reservoirs.