Tese: Cementing Process in the Presence of Fluid Loss
Aluno(a) : Sergio Santiago RibeiroOrientador(a): Mônica Naccache
Área de Concentração: Termociências
Data: 29/10/2020
Link para tese/dissertação: http://doi.org/10.17771/PUCRio.acad.51280
Resumo: This thesis aims to investigate the cementing process of an oil well in presence of a filtrate loss zone. An experimental setup was designed, built and operated to simulate an annular well field-like geometry where cement would cure under controlled conditions. This well simulator consisted of an 8m concentric annular column with a section of semi-permeable external wall, equipped with pressure and temperature sensors. It allows the investigation of the cementing cure mechanisms, as well as the impact of the fluid loss zone in the pressure drop behavior. In order to predict this behavior on real oil wells, a 2D transient numerical model is proposed. A finite element model was implemented in Python with the aid of an open source library named FEniCs. Mass and momentum conservation equations are solved to obtain the pressure and velocity fields, and the cement mixture is considered an incompressible single-phase mixture composed of two chemical species: free-water and dissolved cement. The mass transport is modeled with an advection-diffusion equation and dissolved cement species is modeled as a viscoplastic fluid with shrinkage. Finally, the simulation results were confronted with the experimental data, and a good agreement was observed. Further investigation of numerical model parameters was performed, and a sensitivity analysis evaluated individual influence of those parameters in the pressure drop. The results indicate that pressure profile evolution has a strong dependency on thickening time, fluid loss flow rate magnitude and the Newtonian viscosity plateau for the evaluated shear rate regimen.