Chapter 16: In-Situ Combustion

In-situ combustion (ISC) is the oldest thermal-recovery technique. It has been used for more than nine decades with many economically successful projects. Nevertheless, it is regarded as a high-risk process by many primarily because of the many failures of early field tests. Most of those failures came from the application of a good process (ISC) to the wrong reservoirs or the poorest prospects. An objective of this chapter is to clarify the potential of ISC as an economically viable oil-recovery technique for a variety of reservoirs. This chapter is a summary containing a description of ISC, a discussion of laboratory screening techniques, an illustration of how to apply laboratory results to field design, a review of performance-prediction methods, a discussion of operational practices and problems, and an analysis of field results. For a more complete review, the work of Sarathi, ¹  Prats, ²  and Burger et al.³  should be consulted.