BOAST 98-MC: A Probabilistic Simulation Module for BOAST 98

This work was performed by Advanced Resources International (ARI) on behalf of the United States Department of Energy (DOE) in order to develop a user-friendly, PC-based interface that couples DOE's BOAST 98 software with the Monte Carlo simulation technique. The objectives of the work were to improve reservoir management and maximize oil recoveries by understanding and quantifying reservoir uncertainty as well as improving the capabilities of DOE's BOAST 98 software by incorporating a probabilistic module in the simulator. In this model, probability distributions can be assigned to unknown input parameters such as permeability, porosity, etc. Options have also been added to the input file to be able to vary relative permeability curves as well as well spacing. Hundreds of simulations can then automatically be run to explore the many combinations of uncertain reservoir parameters across their spectrum of uncertainty. Output data such as oil rate and water rate can then be plotted. When historical data are available, they can be uploaded and a least-square error-function run between the simulation data and the history data. The set of input parameters leading to the best match is thus determined. Sensitivity charts (Tornado plots) that rank the uncertain parameters according to the impactmore » they have on the outputs can also be generated.« less