Summary
The expense of subsea well intervention often leads to insufficient
reservoir information for accurately understanding reservoir connectivity,
drainage, and flow assurance. For those wells requiring sand control, an
additional constraint is that sandface sensors must be deployed on a separate
completion run. The objective of a recent engineering development program was
to create a new deployment system that addressed these constraints directly.
Instead of individual gauges on mandrels, digital sensors were miniaturized and
distributed along a single spoolable bridle. In addition, a novel inductive
coupling mechanism was developed to pass power and data from the upper to the
lower completion. In a recent subsea deployment in southeast Asia, such a
coupler was attached to the top of a sensor bridle and both were deployed as
part of an openhole gravel-pack completion. Standard packers and gravel-pack
service tools were used. The system became activated when a mating inductive
coupler was landed as part of the upper completion. Surface indication of
landing was provided by incorporating mechanical feedback into the lower
assembly. With the coupler components in position, the tubing hanger was landed
into the horizontal tree. Upon activation of the electrical penetrator,
high-resolution temperature data were then immediately available across the
length of the sandface, which was an industry first for a subsea producing
well. No additional penetrations were required in the tree.
Development of this system required coordination from the operator because
of the multiple vendors involved in the project. They supervised multiple
qualification and system-integration tests performed over the 2-year
development period to ensure ultimate success in the subsea deployment.
Field results showed that the mating inductive couplers provided
high-efficiency of power transmission so that industry-standard power settings
were sufficient to power a bridle with one sensor per joint of screen. The
sandface data were available onshore during the cleanup phase, allowing the
operator to monitor the cleanup in real time. Once the wells are brought on
line, the sandface data will further enhance the interpretation of flow
allocation and reservoir drainage.
© 2010. Society of Petroleum Engineers
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History
- Original manuscript received:
15 July 2008
- Meeting paper published:
21 September 2008
- Manuscript approved:
15 July 2009
- Published online:
15 April 2010
- Version of record:
14 June 2010
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