TWO-STAGES CEMENT SQUEEZE ABANDONMENT JOB THROUGH COILED TUBING

INTRODUCTION
BJ Services West Venezuela District provides cementing jobs through coiled tubing for well
abandonments and casing cementing squeeze jobs as well, since 1995.
PDVSA (Petrleos de Venezuela, S.A.) has developed a new project to control water production, which
includes water producing sand abandonments in sections where no other strings can work, rather than
coiled tubing strings. Due to that limitation, a new service job procedure has been developed to fulfill
the customer`s expectations, and at the same time, to maximize the uses of coiled tubing strings in
Venezuela including cementing jobs.
One of the main problems for PDVSA, was to manage huge amounts of water on surface facilities,
which required extra capacity and extra costos, or investments related to provide well service with
workover rigs to pull out completion tubing and to work abandonments out with work strings, generating
excesive high costs and time waste.
The main advantage with the coiled tubing, is that no rig is needed to place cement plugs, or to perform
squeeze jobs, minimizing the job costs to a minimum, depending only on the costs related to volume of
additives and the time used for the operation.
THE PROBLEM
The LRF-0049 reservoir has been increasing its water flow production, due to natural water irruption, in
the lower zone of the sand layers. As far as we can keep the water away from flowing into the wellbore,
the more payback we can get from our oilfields. Regarding this fact, the best way to keep water away
from flowing along with the oil is to abandon the lower payzone, where water irruption has been
detected.
SOLUTION
In order to solve the problems described above, without the necesity of using expensive rigs, the
challenge is to design a cement slurry caqpable of deal with the friction stresses of the coiled tubing,
but at the same time, to keep enough viscosity and free water control to perform as a common slurry in
cased or open hole.
For that reason, and including the versatility of a string capable to go all the way to the bottom without
work the completion out, the coiled tubing enhances even more the capabilities and versatility of the
coiled tubing strings for workout purpouses.

OPERATIONAL PROCEDURE
The wells located in Lagocinco Field in the Lake Maracaibo, are artificially lifted with gas (GAL), due to
their low reservoir pressures. Also, the API degree of the oil allows the water to flow easier through the
poral throats.
In this special case, the upper and lower sands appear to have the 90% of water production, and thats
why two different zones should be abandoned, without affect the inner intervals which were good oil
producing sands.
The job was scheduled in two stages: the first stage would place an abandonment plug in front of the
lower perforations, to allow further monitoring of the upper zones. If the water would still flow into the
well, upper sands most likely to produce water would be sealed with ultrafine cement for a second
round of monitoring, and a final mechanical clean out, would let the well ready for oil production.
Well VLC-1433:
This well is vertical with a 2 degree of maximum inclination.
BHT = 310F.
TVD = 13,499 ft.
Reservoir Pressure = 5,000 Psi @ 12,500 ft.
Stage #1:
Safety Valve @ 428 (ID=2.313)

Production Tbg
2-7/8 6.5 lbs/ft
N-80

Mandrel LAG @ 3482

Mandrel deLAG@ 6279
Mandrel de LAG @ 8626
Mandrellde LAG @ 10571
Mandrel de LAG @ 11909
NipleX I.D: 2.313@ 11981
Packer Lock Set @ 12016

Tubing End@ 12036

12822-12836
12900-12912
12992-13016
13052-13057
13077-13082
13086-13092
13113-13117

13258-13266
13299-13302
13307-13312
13332-13336

Rev. 5-1/2@13505 Shoe

The first stage of the job consisted in the abandonment of the lower zone perforations (from 13,258 to
13,336) with a packed gravel plug, sustaining a cement balanced plug, put with coiled tubing.
Afterwards, the well was observed, and its water production still generated around 40% of the whole
production, which means that a second stage (cement squeeze) was necesary to be executed.
Stage #2:
The second stage had as a primary objective, to protect the inner intervals with gravel packed sand,
and then a squeeze job would be performed over it. The main concern in this stage was not to allow the
cement to get in contact with the gravel, because this mixture set might represent a very difficult
obstruction to be cleaned out afterwards. Thats why a polymer gel was required to create isolation
between cement and sand.

Safety Valve @ 428 (ID=2.313)

Production Tbg
2-7/8 6.5 lbs/ft
N-80

Mandrel LAG @ 3482

Mandrel LAG @ 6279
Mandrel LAG @ 8626
Mandrel LAG @ 10571
Mandrel LAG @ 11909
Niple X I.D: 2.313 @ 11981
Packer Lock Set @ 12016

Tubing End @ 12036

12822-12836
12900-12912
12992-13016
13052-13057
13077-13082
13086-13092
13113-13117

Gel Plug 12850 a 12900

Sand Plug 12900 a 13150

Cement Plug 13150 a 13250

13258-13266
13299-13302
13307-13312
13332-13336

Sand Plug 13250 a 13499

Rev. 5-1/2 @13505 Shoe

After the Squeeze job was successfully acomplished, a well clean out was performed to remove the
upper sand plug and the remaining polymer gel from the producing zones. After that, the well reduced
its water production from 80% to 20% @ 300 bpd.
The slurry used, was tested under the bottom hole conditions in presurized consistometers, and UCA
simulators to obtain the ideal slurry capable to face all the challenges to be overcome by the cement to
achieve its goal:

Slurry Description:
H Class Cement + 0.8% FL-52 + 1% CD-32 + 0.35gps R-21L + 0.02gps FP-6L + 35% S-8
Density:
15 ppg
75 Bc:
8 hrs 25 min
BHST: 310F
Yield:
1.74 ft/sk
Fluid Loss:
34.0 (ml/30min)
BHCT: 272F
Water Req: 7.49 gal/sk.
Free Water: 0.0 (%)
BHP: 7,400 Psi
Depth: 13,250 ft

CONCLUSION
The application of coiled tubing for cementing jobs, gives a large amount of workover applications,
which mean a lower manteinance well cost, and a more versatile tool, and the advantage of cementing
backup system available for emergency contingencies.
The main advantage of this technique is to count on a safe job without a large amount of equipment or
logisticts with a lower price and a more accurate tool to pump and clean wellbores: Coiled Tubing.
Manuel S. Navarro , West Venezuela