Application of Laboratory PVT Data to Reservoir Engineering Problems

The paper summarizes the historical background of thepressure-volume-temperature analyses of reservoir fluids, the errors involvedin both the sampling and testing of reservoir fluids, the type of informationrequired of a PVT determination, and the field conditions that limit theapplication of anyone analysis. Particular emphasis is placed on the necessityfor approximating as closely as possible the liberation sequence occurring inthe producing formation, flow string, and surface separators. A combineddifferential and flash or "composite" liberation is suggested as thebest means of approximating this liberation sequence. Historical Background Petroleum reservoir engineering commonly is considered to be one of thenewest fields of petroleum science, yet much work of a theoretical andintuitive nature was done many years before the modern techniques of reservoiranalyses were developed. The period 1910–1924 saw considerable work in the field of reservoirbehavior done by the U. S. Bureau of Mines. This work, although entirelytheoretical, pointed out the importance of gas in the recovery of oil from thereservoir. The statement by J. O. Lewis that 20 per cent or less of theoil originally in place in a pool was recovered from the ground under uncurtailedproduction conditions caused some operators to re-examine and modify theirproduction methods. However, though these works showed methods of productionthat have subsequently resulted in greater oil recoveries, they in general wentunnoticed, even though there was a fear that the nation's petroleum resourceswere being exhausted. The period 1924–1933 saw the industry take considerably more interest inreservoir behavior because of an unfounded fear of its inability to replace oilreserves, the possibility of government regulation, and the energy of one man, Henry L. Doherty. Doherty aroused heated discussions in the industry concerningconservation. To prove or disprove his theories the first experimental work onthe reservoir behavior of petroleum was undertaken. The papers of Dow andCalkin, Beecher and Parkhurst, and Mills and Heithecker are classics althoughtheir experimental procedures were crude. These papers proved that theproperties of petroleum in the reservoir are quite dissimilar to the propertiesmeasured at the well head. Gas dissolved in the oil phase was recognized ashaving considerable importance as had been predicted by the earliertheorists. T.P. 3710