Masters Theses

Keywords and Phrases

Glass; Oil and gas; Plug and abandonment; Well barrier; Well integrity; Zonal isolation

Abstract

"Well inflow control is a major challenge for the oil and gas industry. Erle Haliburton revolutionized well inflow control with his patent for cementing oil wells in 1921. Soon after, cement became the accepted material to establish well integrity and has been ever since. Cement is used in all phases of the well life cycle, and it is expected to hold indefinitely once set. Yet based on the nature of cement and the placement techniques, flow pathways may develop from improper cementing jobs or from cement degradation over time. Well integrity is especially crucial for wellbore plugging and abandonment, since the cement plugs act as barriers to flow for reservoir fluids and underground sources of drinking water. Yet large numbers of wells have ‘live annuli’, indicating some inflow into the annulus and the large occurrence of such wells provide motivation to explore other materials to create wellbore seals.

The following project provides a qualitative exploration of borosilicate glass for inflow control in Berea sandstone. Glass is a chemically innate material with virtually no permeability. With the ability to manipulate its chemical and mechanical properties, there is potential for glass to remedy the degradation seen in cement while forming a plug suitable for downhole conditions.

In this experiment, a sample of borax was melted on the end of a Berea sandstone sample. The project was able to form a borosilicate glass seal to the sandstone core. The permeability of the sandstone decreased by 94.57% from 95.01 mD to 5.16 mD. The glass seal had a plugging factor of 18.49. While the glass did not seal the sandstone completely, the 94.57% reduction in permeability yields promising results for future work”--Abstract, page iii.

Advisor(s)

Dunn-Norman, Shari

Committee Member(s)

Brow, Richard K.
Reidmeyer, Mary R.
Imqam, Abdulmohsin

Department(s)

Geosciences and Geological and Petroleum Engineering

Degree Name

M.S. in Petroleum Engineering

Publisher

Missouri University of Science and Technology

Publication Date

Fall 2017

Pagination

x, 88 pages

Note about bibliography

Includes bibliographic references (pages 83-87).

Rights

© 2017 Tri-Tris Bao Nguyen, All rights reserved.

Document Type

Thesis - Open Access

File Type

text

Language

English

Thesis Number

T 12093

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