Geostatistical Modeling of Gridblock Permeabilities for 3D Reservoir Simulators

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Abstract
Summary: A geostatistical method is presented to determine the absolute horizontal and vertical effective permeabilities at the reservoir block scale from core support-scale values required for 3D reservoir flow simulations. The key element of the geostatistical model is the definition of block support-scale permeabilities as the spatial power average of core-support values over the volume of a reservoir gridblock. Block support-scale permeabilities are then found to be a function of the permeability variogram, the averaging volume, and a power-averaging constant, which is derived separately for horizontal and vertical flow with a numerical approach. The application of the proposed method requires that core-support values be available within each reservoir block. These values are generated with the technique of conditional simulation. This technique provides simulated values reproducing the actual core data at sampled locations and their statistical properties. The approach developed for the determination of permeability input to full-field simulators is demonstrated by an application to the Crystal Viking field "H" pool in Alberta.