Economic Factors Involved in Waterflooding

All factors involved in waterflooding, as in any business venture, are influenced by economics. Obviously, consideration of each is essential to a successful operation, for without complete comprehension of each, a failure may result that otherwise could have been foreseen. The factors are complex and interwoven within each other; however, they can be generally categorized into three areas of major delineation, i.e. (1) evaluation and/or acquisition, (2) cost estimation, and (3) effects of restricted production as impose by insufficient financing and/or state regulatory body control. This paper will attempt to briefly discuss the constituent parts of these factors and present certain average values resulting from actual field operations. Some of the values may serve as useful criterion in evaluation of a prospect's flooding potential, but the engineer is forewarned that "rules of thumb" figures such as these are useful only in specific application and are not intended for any other use. The individual factors vary considerably due to features such as depth, well spacing, well density, field symmetry, geology of pay zone, water supply, power supply, etc.; however, it is hoped that some of the figures will be useful to the engineer when applied to comparable floods.