Published by the DTI Oil & Gas Directorate for the reservoir engineering and IOR community in the UK.
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The Challenge of Low Deliverabilty

Pete Naylor, AEA Technology, looks at the issues that are preventing the development of the many so far undeveloped UKCS discoveries (pete.naylor@aeat.co.uk)

The large portfolio of undeveloped UKCS discoveries is a significant target for reserve additions and new investment. Various studies have confirmed that there are over 300 undeveloped discoveries, estimated to contain aggregate reserves in excess of six billion barrels of oil equivalent. The PILOT Undeveloped Discoveries Workgroup gathered information from industry, suppliers and Government and used this to rank perceived barriers to progress with UKCS undeveloped discoveries. DTI took forward a recommendation to address a number of key barriers and focused initially on the barrier of well deliverability. This article highlights the results of the study.

Literature reviews were conducted and data on undeveloped discoveries were collated. This information was used to generate a list of undeveloped discoveries, which were considered to suffer low deliverability. A series of meetings was then held with oil companies and service/technology providers, to better understand the specific barriers and potential solutions.

A number of well deliverability barriers were identified and their relative importance is illustrated in Figure 1. The key technical barriers for oil are uncertain reservoir characterisation, compartmentalisation and low permeability.

Figure 1: Percentage Reserves Associated With Key Barriers (Click for a larger image)

A range of enabling technologies is available and their potential impact is illustrated in Figure 2. There appears to be no significant technology gap and key solutions include improved seismic, advanced wells and hydraulic fracturing.

Figure 2: Percentage Reserves Associated With Key Solutions (Click for a larger image)

In practice, the major hurdles are often contractual and/or commercial. The drive towards low cost is often at the expense of adding value. The UK appears somewhat conservative and less willing to accept technical and economic risk when compared to elsewhere in the world. Potential solutions include:

• Adoption of value based procurement practices
• Use of structured risk assessments
• Use of risk sharing contracts

The knowledge gained from the company meetings formed the basis for a DTI workshop on "The Challenge of Low Deliverability" on 22 May 2001. The results were also presented and discussed at the LOGIC "Accelerated Developments" conference on 23-24 May 2001. The project report may be obtained by clicking HERE.

This project was conducted for the DTI by AEA Technology. A parallel project conducted for the DTI by RML also provided some of the data.

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