Abstract: Rejuvenation of a Giant Oil Field--Quiriquire Field, Venezuela: A Team Approach

Harlan Friestad, Robert Hull, David Miller

Quiriquire field is located in the Maturin basin of eastern Venezuela, at the southeastern corner of the Serrania del Interior mountain range. Since its discovery in 1928, the field has produced over 750 MMBO from a stratigraphically trapped, shallow, Pliocene alluvial fan (Quiriquire Formation). A deep oil zone, the Los Jabillos sand of Oligocene age, was discovered in 1952 on a deep thrust anticline situated below the shallow oil field. Both zones potentially have significant reserves yet to be recovered. In 1994, Maxus, BP, and Otepi began working with Lagoven to rejuvenate oil production from both zones. Maxus, as operator, has been utilizing geologists, geophysicists, petrophysicists, and reservoir, drilling, construction, and environmental engineers, working togethe as a team, to fully evaluate the most economic methods of developing these remaining reserves.

A program of reactivation and recompletion of old wells, as well as the drilling of deviated infill wells, stepouts, and new exploration plays has been formulated by the team. A staged approach to the broad program will enable Maxus to prioritize those projects which have the best economic return. The use of new technology in seismic, drilling, logging, and completions is expected to improve the recovery of oil over previous conventional methods. Using modern technology to enhance the understanding of the structural and stratigraphic trapping mechanisms, the team has defined and built structural and seismic models to help identify possible productive reservoirs.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90951©1996 AAPG International Conference and Exhibition, Caracas, Venezuela