For thin-oil-rim reservoirs, well placement, well type, well path, and the completion methods must be evaluated with close integration of key reservoir and production-engineering considerations. This involves maximizing reservoir-fluid contact and drainage, optimizing well productivity, and optimizing the well life-cycle production profile along the wellbore. Field-implementation cases in Malaysia have shown that this integrated approach can significantly minimize the well count, enhance the well performance, and improve the ultimate recovery per well in thin-oil-rim reservoirs with varying reservoir complexity and uncertainties.
Introduction
Development of oil-rim reservoirs in Malaysia has been improved progressively in recent years through a series of reservoir-engineering studies and successful field implementations. Although typical oil-rim reservoirs are characteristically wedged between a gas cap and an underlying aquifer, they can be structurally very complicated, with faults and flow boundaries having varying dips and saddles.
