New Life from an Old Field-PKCU #2 Waterflood

Abstract The Pembina Keystone Cardium Unit #2 is located on the eastern edge of the Pembina Cardium oilfield. PKCU #2 has been on primary depletion for over 40 years and was nearing the end of its economic life. In late 1995 the Pembina Exploitation Team within Canadian Oxy decided to review the area in detail one last time. The final result of the exhaustive work, which included core floods, geological review, a 3D simulation, facilities and production optimization review, and a reservoir depletion plan, was a large scale waterflood on a depleted field. It is expected that the recovery factor for the waterflood will be 20% as compared to the primary recovery factor of 11%. The over 10,000,000 BOEs of incremental reserves will be developed for < $3.00/BOE. Waterflood start up was anticipated for late summer 1998. Author's Note Since this paper was originally written the following actions have taken place. CanadianOxy and Working Interest Owner approval was granted in the third quarter of 1997. Facilities Engineering and Operations began the process of consultation with area residents and gaining pipeline right of ways. Construction was set to begin in the Summer of 1998. Within CanadianOxy at that time a review of our properties was conducted. It was decided that all of CanadianOxy's Pembina properties would be sold. All work in the field was suspended. PKCU #2, along with the rest of CanadianOxy's Pembina properties, were sold to Penn West Petroleum in December 1998. Penn West is currently reviewing a scaled down version of the Keystone Waterflood. Introduction With the discovery of the Pembina Oilfield in the mid-1950s rapid development drilling was followed by the implementation of a waterflood. Most of the Pembina Cardium was under waterflood by the mid-1960s. The main western portion of the Pembina Cardium, centered around the town of Drayton Valley, was developed using waterflood on 80-acre spacing 5-spots. The southeastern portion of the Pembina Cardium, centered around the Village of Breton, was anomalous. Most of it was developed on 160 acre spacing on primary depletion. PKCU #2 is located in the SE portion of the field. Historically any secondary recovery scheme at PKCU #2 was deemed to be too risky for some of the following reasons:The overlying conglomerate would act as a thief zoneThe low reservoir pressureThe old geologic model of the sandstone which consisted of independent sand lenses was poor for waterfloodingThe value of the gas and liquids The uncertainty and risk with waterflooding PKCU #2 meant that the project could never get corporate and partner approval until some of the following questions were answered:Can you successfully waterflood a reservoir with high gas saturation and low pressure?What is the true geologic model?What is the cost of implementing a waterflood?What production and recovery could be anticipated?What is the downside risk? The 1995 Waterflood study included the following elements which were meant to answer all questions and concerns:

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