Analysis of Horizontal Well Steam Front Considering Discreted Wellbore Model

During the steam stimulation with horizontal wells in heavy oil reservoirs, the heating area of a horizontal well is very important to the productivity evaluation and performance forecast. Traditionally, without considering steam friction loss in wellbore which results in the variable mass flow, the shape of heating range along the production section is the hemisphere + column + hemisphere, or is a ellipse which has the both ends of horizontal well as its focuses. The front of the heating range is the steam front, therefore, the steam front is very important. Using discrete model of horizontal well with thermal recovery in heavy oil reservoir, the steam front is studied. Both variable mass flow of steam and coupling of wellbore and formation are considered in the discreted wellbore model. The results show that the steam front is a similar horn-shaped, which provides experimental and theory basis for thermal recovery with horizontal well in heavy oil reservoir. And the steam front becomes smaller from heel to toe of the horizontal well. The higher the oil viscosity is, the smaller the heating range is. Compared to the ellipse-shape model, the accuracy of the horn-shape model is improved.