SPE 114995

Application of Flowing p/Z* Material Balance for Dry Coalbed-Methane

Reservoirs
K. Morad, SPE, Fekete Associates Inc., and C.R. Clarkson, SPE, ConocoPhillips

Copyright 2008, Society of Petroleum Engineers

This paper was prepared for presentation at the CIPC/SPE Gas Technology Symposium 2008 Joint Conference held in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, 1619 June 2008.

This paper was selected for presentation by an SPE program committee following review of information contained in an abstract submitted by the author(s). Contents of the paper have not been
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Abstract
Material balance analysis is a fundamental technique for estimating gas-in-place. It can be achieved using: 1) Static material
balance, using static (shut-in) reservoir pressures, where a plot of static p/z versus cumulative gas production is created to
estimate original-gas-in-place (OGIP) or 2) Flowing material balance where gas rates and flowing pressures are used to
estimate average reservoir pressure.

The flowing material balance concept of Agarwal-Gardner (1999) was extended to dry coalbed methane (CBM) reservoirs by
Clarkson et al. (2007a) and Gerami et al. (2007) and to 2-phase (gas and water) CBM wells by Clarkson et al. (2007b). The
present study further enhances the flowing material balance for dry CBM reservoirs by presenting a p/z* implementation of
the concept.

This application, while accounting for the distinguishing characteristics of a CBM reservoir, uses the industry-standard
practice of p/z material balance to calculate original-gas-in-place. As with the Agarwal-Gardner approach, the flowing p/z*
method can be applied to variable gas rates and/or flowing pressures conditions.

In the present work, the derivation and iterative procedure of calculations are explained. Several test cases based on
dry/immobile water saturation using real and synthetic data were generated. The resulting estimates of OGIP calculated from
implementation of flowing p/z* material balance show excellent agreement and the estimated OGIPs are reliable.

Introduction
Material balance is the application of mass balance to a producing reservoir. As gas is produced, the reservoir pressure
declines. By monitoring the cumulative gas production and the average reservoir pressure, and using the PVT properties of
gas, one can determine OGIP and the remaining gas-in-place.

Material balance analysis, although simple and more reliable than volumetrics calculation, does suffer from a number of
shortcomings and limitations. For example, to measure the average reservoir pressure the well has to be shut-in and that
means loss of production. Among other complexities are:
low permeabilities lead to poor pressure build-ups (long-buildup times required)
pressure build-up can be masked in multiple coal seams
reservoir can be recharged from aquifers
CBM reservoirs have additional complexities. The gas storage mechanism as well as the compressibility of CBM reservoirs
is dominated by adsorption. These and other CBM-specific characteristics have to be accounted for in any material balance
calculations.

Mattar and McNeil (1998) presented the concept of flowing material balance for constant gas production rate. They showed
that average reservoir pressure can be extracted from flowing pressures provided that both the gas production rates and
flowing bottomhole pressures are measured. By calculating the average reservoir pressure from flowing bottomhole pressures
they were able to perform material balance without the need to shut-in the well. Mattar and Anderson (2005) extended and
2 SPE 114995

generalized this method to variable gas production rates. They called it dynamic material balance to contrast between this
method with the traditional material balance application where static reservoir pressures were needed.

Palacio and Blasingame (1993) and Agarwal et al. (1999), among others in the field of production data analysis, have
demonstrated that if the flow time, t, is replaced by material-balance time, tc, in case of liquid, or material-balance-pseudo-
time, tca, in case of gas, the equations developed for constant rate flowing material balance will be valid for variable rate
production.

As for application of dynamic material balance to CBM, the Agarwal-Gardner-like flowing material balance calculations,
while using the concept of material-balance pseudo-time and accounting for the CBM-specific properties, use normalized
cumulative production. This value becomes a true representation of cumulative gas production only when the material
balance line intercepts the cumulative gas production axis and does not anywhere else. The proposed method addresses this
shortcoming by using the actual cumulative gas production. The graphical presentation of dynamic p/z* versus actual
cumulative production is the more familiar p/z format to reservoir engineers.

Agarwal-Gardner Flowing Material Balance

Fundamental Development
Starting from the volumetric formulation of kings material balance equation for dry coalbed methane reservoirs (King, 1990,
1993):

p pi G G p
= (1-a)
z * zi* G

z
z* =
VL p
B
pL + p
(1 c ( p p ) ) +
f i

(1-b)

Bg

By taking partial differentiation of the LHS of equation (1-a) with respect to time, will get:

d p d p dp d
= (2)
dt z * dp z * d dt
Where ( p ) is pseudo-pressure and is defined as:

p
p
( p) = 2 dp (3)
pb
z

d p
Using equations (1) and (3) and manipulating of the term will lead to:
dp z *
d p pi q (t )
= (4.a)
dt z * zi*G

dp z
= (4.b)
d 2 p

d p p
= ( c f + cg + cd ) (4.c)
dp z * z
SPE 114995 3

Replacing the RHS terms in equation (2) with the terms expressed in equations 4.a to 4.c, results in:

i 2 pi
= *
tca (5)
q c i zi G
*
ti
*

*
where tca is the material balance pseudo-time and is calculated as:

cti* i
t
q (t )
=
*
tca dt (6)
q ( t ) 0 ( p ) ct* ( p )
Given the following equality for coal (assuming dry coal and negligible formation compressibility):

zi*G = zi G f (7)

We can re-write equation (5) as:

i 2 pi
= *
tca (8)
q c i zi G f
*
ti

Now starting again from the boundary dominated solution:

2t D 3
Dw ( tD ) = 2
+ An ( reD ) (9)
reD 4
Where:
khTsc
Dw =
Psc qT
( i wf ) (10.a)

r
rD = (10.b)
rw

*
ktca
tD = (10.c)
i cti rw2
Replacing the dimensionless terms of 10 a-c in equation (9) results in:

Psc qT 2k P qT re
i wf = t * + sc ln 0.75
khTsc i cti re * 2 ca
khTsc rwa
(11.a)
2qpi Psc qT re
= t *
+ ln 0.75
i cti* G f Z i ca
khTsc rwa

2qpi *
i wf = t + qbpss (11.b)
i cti* G f zi ca
Where bpss is given by equation (11.c):

PscT re
bpss = ln 0.75 (11.c)
khTsc rwa
4 SPE 114995

Flowing p/z* Material Balance

Eliminating i between equations (8) and (11.b), we obtain:

= wf + qbpss (12)

As can be seen from equation (12), the difference between average reservoir pressure and bottomhole flowing pressure is
constant if the well is flowing at constant rate. In case of variable rates, this difference is a function of rate.
Given the flowing pseudo-pressure and the value of bpss , we can use equation (12) to calculate the average reservoir pseudo-
pressure. Using values, we can calculate p and p / z * and plot the p / z * values versus cumulative gas production gas
production to estimate G.

Calculation of bpss

Pressure Transient Approach

Equations (8) and (12) are combined into equation (13) to estimate bpss :

i wf 2 pi
= *
tca + bpss (13)
q i cti G f Z i
*

Equation (13) shows that a Cartesian plot of normalized draw-down ( i wf ) q versus material balance pseudo-time
( t ) will yield a straight line (at pseudo-steady-state flow regime) with a y-intercept of b
*
ca pss .

Rate Transient Approach

Agarwal et al. (1999) showed that plots of dimensional wellbore pressure versus dimensionless cumulative production (based
on area) during transient flow will result in separate curves for different re/rws. During pseudo-steady-state, however, they
asymptotically merge into a single line with x-intercept of 1/2. This notion can be applied in a simpler manner by plotting
dimensionless wellbore pressure versus dimensionless cumulative production (based on area) multiplied by 2. In this case
the x-intercept will be equal to 1. The cumulative production can then be obtained from slope of the line.
These formats although great diagnostic tools especially when dealing with noisy data, do not lead directly to cumulative gas
production or Original-Gas-In-Place.
To address this shortcoming, we start from equation (13) and by:
Replacing free gas ( G f ) with total gas ( G ) using equation (7)

Multiplying both sides of equation (12) by q ( i wf )

Dividing by bpss and re-arranging
we arrive at an alternative formulation that is referred to as Flowing Material Balance equation:
q 1 2 pi q 1 1
= t* (14)
i wf bpss i cti GZ i bpss i wf ca
* *

We can re-arrange equation (14) and write it as:

q 1 1 2 pi q 1
= *
tca (15)
i wf bpss bpss G i cti Z i i wf
* *

Using the material balance equation of (8), we replace the term 2 pi q ( i cti zi ) in equation (15) and obtain:
q 1 1 i
= G (16)
i wf bpss bpss G i wf

Plotting q ( i wf ) versus normalized cumulative gas production i

G will result in a straight line. As can be
i wf
SPE 114995 5

i
deducted from the formulation,
i wf
G is not exactly equal to G. However, as q ( i wf ) approaches 0,
i
approaches wf and G approaches G . As such, the resulting straight line will intercept the x-axis at, G but will
i wf
not be a representative of actual cumulative production any where in between.

Examples
The proposed approach for flowing p/z* material balance is applied to two sets of data. In the first example, a set of synthetic
production data based on variable bottomhole flowing pressure are generated. The second set of data is actual production data
obtained from a producing Horseshoe Canyon well. The applicable data for both examples are listed in Table 1. The flowing
p/z* material balance plots are plotted in figures 1 and 2.

A comparison between results obtained from flowing p/z* material balance and volumetric calculations are provided in Table
2. The volumetric calculations for example 1 is based on the known drainage area (used to generate the synthetic rates) and
for example 2 is based on the drainage area obtained from history match of production data. These results display good
agreement between the two approaches.

Conclusions
In this work, a flowing p/z* material balance methodology is introduced for the analysis of production and flowing pressures
obtained from single-phase (gas) coalbed methane wells. The method has a practical advantage over previously-introduced
versions of the flowing material balance equation, based upon the Agarwal-Gardner approach, in that cumulative gas
production is used on the x-axis of the Cartesian plot instead of a normalized cumulative production. The p/z* approach
therefore retains the familiarity of the traditional static p/z vs. cum. plot used for conventional reservoirs and static p/z* vs.
cum. used for CBM reservoirs. The ability of the new method to estimate OGIP for dry CBM wells is demonstrated with
both simulated and field examples. The new method should prove useful for CBM reservoir engineers performing reserves
estimates for single-phase CBM wells.

Acknowledgement
The authors have benefited from technical discussions with Louis Mattar and would like to thank him for his guidance and
contributions to this paper.

Nomenclature
bPSS, Constant, Eq. 11.b
Bg, Gas formation volume factor, ft3/std.ft3
cf Formation compressibility, psi-1
cg Gas compressibility, psi-1
cd Desorption compressibility, psi-1
ct* Modified total compressibility, psi-1
cti* Initial modified total compressibility, psi-1
h Formation thickness, ft
k Absolute permeability, md
G Initial total gas-in-place, std. ft3
Gf Initial free gas-in-place, std. ft3
Gp Cumulative gas production, std. ft3
p Pressure, psia
p Average reservoir pressure, psia
pb Arbitrary base pressure, psia
pi Initial pressure, psia
pL Langmuir pressure, psia
psc Standard pressure, psia
q Production rate at standard conditions, ft3/s
r Radius, ft
rD Dimensionless radius, ft
re Reservoir radius, ft
reD Dimensionless reservoir radius. Ft
rw Wellbore radius, m
rwa Apparent wellbore radius, ft
t Time, s
6 SPE 114995

tca* Modified pseudo-time, s

tD Dimensionless time, s
T Reservoir temperature, R
Tsc Standard temperature, R
VL Langmuir Volume, std ft3/ton coal
Z Gas compressibility factor, dimensionless
z* Modified compressibility factor, dimensionless
zi* Initial modified compressibility factor, dimensionless
Porosity, dimensionless fraction
Gas viscosity, cP
i Initial gas viscosity, cP
B Bulk density, g/cm3
Pseudo-pressure, psia2/cP
Pseudo-pressure calculated at average reservoir pressure, psia2/cP
i Pseudo-pressure calculated at initial reservoir pressure, psia2/cP
wf Pseudo-pressure calculated at flowing wellbore pressure, psia2/cP

References
Agarwal, R.G., Gardner, D.C., Kleinsteiber, S.W. and Fussell, D.D. 1999. Analyzing Well Production Data Using Combined
Type Curve and Decline Curve Analysis Concepts. SPEREE 2 (5): 478-486,. SPE-57916-PA.
Clarkson, C.R., Bustin, R.M., and Seidle, J.P. 2007a. Production-Data Analysis of Single-Phase (Gas) Coalbed-Methane
Wells. SPEREE 10 (3): 312331. SPE-100313-PA.
Clarkson, C.R., Jordan, C.L., Gierhart, R.R., and Seidle, J.P. 2007b. Production Data Analysis of CBM Wells. Paper SPE
107705 presented at the SPE Rocky Mountain Oil and Gas Technology Symposium, Denver, Colorado, 1618 April.
Gerami, S., Pooladi-Darvish, M., Morad, K. and Mattar, L. 2007. Type Curves for Dry CBM Reservoirs with Equilibrium
Desorption. Paper CICP 2007-011 presented at 58th Canadian International Petroleum Conference, Calgary, Alberta, 12-
14 June.
King, G.R. 1993. Material Balance Techniques for Coal Seam and Devonian Shale Gas Reservoirs. SPERE 8 (1): 67-72.
SPE-20730-PA.
King, G. R. 1990. Material-Balance Techniques for Coal-Seam and Devonian Shale Gas Reservoirs with Limited Water
Influx. Paper SPE 20730 presented at the 65th SPE Annual Technical Conference and Exhibition, New Orleans,
Louisiana, 23-26 September.
Palacio, J.C. and Blasingame, T.A. 1993. Decline Curve Analysis Using Type Curves Analysis of Gas Well Production Data.
Paper SPE 25909 presented at the 1993, Joint Rocky Mountain Regional and Low Permeability Reservoirs Symposium,
Denver, Colorado, 26-28 April.
SPE 114995 7

Input Parameters Example 1 Example 2

Langmuir Volume, scf/ton 250 155
Langmuir Pressure, psia 400 547
Initial Reservoir Pressure, psia 400 86
Gas Content, scf/ton 125 21
Net Pay, ft 35 59.9
Bulk Density, g/cm3 1.4 1.33
Temperature, F 110 67
Porosity, % 2 0.1
Table 1. Reservoir Parameters for examples

Example 1 Example 2
flowing p/z* material balance 1.435 0.138
Volumetrics 1.460 0.134
Table 2. Comparison of results: OGIP in bscf

Figure 1. Flowing p/z* material balance based on synthetic data (boundary dominated
flow)
8 SPE 114995

Figure 2. Flowing p/z* material balance based on production data from Horseshoe
Canyon producing well