From LSE- No water returning is GOOD!
I've found some interesting stuff while trying to get my head around why we have a vertical drill, why we need to soak etc etc. Turns out the fact that not much water has come back is actually good, quoting a clever man researchy oil nerd type.. "We found that you want the reservoir to keep that water," said Schechter. "It's counterintuitive. It's breaking old practices. Before it was assumed if water penetrates the formation, then it will block the oil flow, thereby reducing well productivity. What we're finding is if water penetrates in by capillary imbibition and you get very little water back, the implication is the aqueous phase has imbibed into the rock and displaced oil into the fractures and that's actually a good thing." Read more at:
https://phys.org/news/2017-07-recovery-tight-shale-reservoirs.html#jCp I also wonder if the amount of frac flud we put in was enough for both the upper and lower zones, or were we just pumping enough in for the one, and now its effectiveness is halved as it tries to fill two zones ? Anyhoo, its soaking in quite merrily apparently, and water being denser than oil should shove the oil out, especially given our 'much higher than expected permeability'. What worries me slightly is that we only have a small 3 or 4 inch pipe going straight down 11000 ft. It could miss, land up in a dry bit of rock, or go right past the ideal spot. The accuracy needed is mindblowing . Vertical drilling is however much cheaper, quicker and easier, so I guess its worth a shot first, as you'd need a vertical drill first anyway before you kick off horizontally,. PB should have all this figured out, and I'm sure if we don't get hydrocarbons, he'll assume he's missed and try a different depth or kick out horizontally a bit until he hears a whooshing sound . I'm just bummed I didn't sell at 4p and buy back in now. Hey ho, the clue's in the log in name. I'm nervously confident and wish the weeks would fly by. Good luck all, esp those who've been hanging in for a while like me.
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