Case Studies
Case Study: Increasing Production Yields
This customer desired to increase production from declining wells in the South China Sea, just off the Northern shore of Borneo..
| Company | Sarawak Shell (Shell Malaysia, a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell) |
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| Product | Crude Oil |
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| Location | South China Sea... North Shore of Borneo |
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| Situation | All oil produced can be sold. Oil prices are at ~US$50 per barrel. Oil wells' production is controlled through lift gas injection. Over or under-injecting yields decreased production. Must "ride" the peak of the production curve in real-time based on specific dynamics by well. 5 wells need simultaneous optimization. Set of wells are already the showcase of "SmartWell" technology in Shell (highly optimized, closely attended to) |
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| Objective | Maximize production on already heavily optimized gas lifted wells. |
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| Method | Online direct optimizer (Live Optimizer) put on-line to test wells while optimizing. Resulting data was used to model well behaviors as they respond to changes in lift gas injection rates. Developed model-based optimization scheme. Implemented closed-loop process optimizers to determine optimal injection rate within constraints in real-time. |
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| Result | Increased production by 10%, 80% of which is attributed directly to BioComp software and services. Total production gains opportunity exceeds US $4,000,000 per year. |
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| Reference Available? | Yes. Paper written and presented by the customer at the Offshore Technology Conference in 2004. Available on request. |