Abstract
Oil production from the unconventional Vaca Muerta play is increasing as a result of a rigorous appraisal and exploitation strategy. Multiple wells have already demonstrated the potential of the Neuquén Basin, however optimization is still ongoing to determine the best practice for completing wells.
A stand out difference of the Vaca Muerta play is its thickness (100 m to 450 m), as such a development strategy based solely on vertical wells is being considered in addition to the horizontal well strategy more commonly applied in other shale plays.
The thickness of the Vaca Muerta formation creates new challenges and opportunities due to the stratigraphic variation in petrophysical and mechanical properties which can affect fracture effectiveness and well productivity. Completion design, geology and production performance need to be linked. Specifically, the geology of the Vaca Muerta formation, as is the case in most reservoirs, varies significantly more in the vertical direction in comparison to the horizontal direction. With optimum solutions not necessarily being intuitive, numerical simulation is critical as it enables a large number of variables to be analyzed and their individual impact understood and quantified.
The objective of this paper is to present the four different approaches that have been used to build numerical models to represent the vertical wells in Vaca Muerta.
These are:
A single layer model with a planar fracture placed in a zone of improved permeability to represent the Stimulated Rock Volume (SRV) which is then surrounded by undisturbed matrix.
A multilayer model with multiple planar fractures placed in an undisturbed matrix.
A multilayer model with multiple planar fractures (one per stage), the SRV surrounding the fractures and the undisturbed matrix behind it.
A multilayer model, where the SRV is modeled within a dual porosity model.
This work shows how these models were constructed, the measurements that were honored and the estimation and justification of values assumed for unknown parameters. The impact of the different methodologies on the time taken and quality of the history match obtained and subsequent forecasts is also discussed.
YPF has collected an extensive data set including PLTs, microseismic surveys, downhole pressure gauges, and pressure build ups, which has been used to constrain the numerical models. Building and history matching these models has been challenging but enables conclusions to be made about rock, fluid and completion interaction that cannot be obtained otherwise. The simpler models, have in some cases, enabled rapid estimates to be made for EUR which have subsequently been supported by the results from the more detailed modeling approaches.
