An offshore oil and gas field located in the Campos Basin of Brazil required an integrated digital oilfield solution to help engineers make better decisions and optimize field operations. The field had real-time instrumentation, but some critical nodes were missing information, resulting in production losses and missed optimization opportunities. The client had a long-standing relationship with IPCOS, having worked on several upstream projects, and chose them to implement the solution.
The Challenge
The field had three areas, and production relied heavily on artificial lift manifolds, which had up to four caisson ESPs to pump oil to the surface. However, engineers lacked important information, such as pump performance curves and gas volume fraction, making it challenging to operate at an optimum frequency. IPCOS worked closely with production and reservoir engineers and operations teams to develop a well-calibrated physics-based well and network model using Petroleum Experts Integrated Production Modelling suite of applications. They configured engineering workflows in IFM to use the latest GAP model and field measurement to calculate rates at well and network levels.
The Results
The solution enabled engineers to view pump operating points in real-time and optimize pump performance without damaging them. As a result, the field had an optimization opportunity and was able to increase production by about 2% over the daily average production within two months of implementing this functionality. It also enabled timely interventions, leading to an estimated daily deferment reduction greater than 2 MM$/year for the field. The digital oilfield solution has been quickly embedded into different work streams. Development has started for extending the product to flow assurance and topside operating envelope disciplines.
