ABSTRACT
Production well optimization and
modeling is very important in the efficient management of oil and gas
production from a well. A major factor contributing to this process is
the accurate estimations of the flowing bottom-hole pressure at the
formation as it helps in various petroleum production engineering
analysis. Some of these analysis include studies on Vertical Lift
Performance (VLP) and Inflow Performance. The effective determination of
bottom-hole pressure has been a major concern in the industry due to
several reasons as it can either be measured or estimated. In the case
of measurement, a pressure gauge is needed down-hole, this is very
accurate but expensive and time consuming. For this reason, this project
will focus on flowing bottom-hole pressure estimation from wellhead
pressure and data as it is generally cost effective and it can be easily
determined within a short period of time. This will be achieved through
the modification of Guo’s (2001) method of simultaneous flow of gas,
oil, water and sand particles (4-phase flow) in borehole tubing. Guo’s
model will be modified and will only consider the frictional pressure
gradient term in the general energy equation and account for only
vertical multiphase flow. The result of this work obtained with the use
of mat lab when applied to simulation of two phase flow in vertical oil
wells and high Gas-Oil ratio wells are relatively accurate. However, low
Gas-Oil ratio wells fall short of the model estimation of pressure.