Paper: Waterflood Case History Caprock Queen Field

Waterflooding in the Caprock Queen Field began with a pilot waterflood initiated in 1956. Today, essentially the entire field is under waterflood. There are 13 different projects in operation; eleven are units while two are of the cooperative type. All P3 projects have utilized 80- acre five-spot patterns. This case history is presented in order to depict the general performance of 13 successful Queen Sand waterfloods, and should be helpful in predicting the performance of other waterfloods that may be initiated in similar reservoirs. In many cases the engineer, is forced to use experience factors or "rules of thumb" in order to predict the performance of a proposed waterflood. When adequate reservoir, data is available he should, of course, make use of it in predicting performance. However, even after making calculations and the corresponding predictions, the engineer should attempt to compare his predictions with actual performance of other floods, either in operation or depleted, which are similar to the flood he is proposing. Quite often there are floods in the same field or in the same formation in a nearby field that are comparable to the proposed flood. A review of the performance of similar floods can be helpful, not only in designing the injection system and selecting a pattern, but also in making a reasonable predication of the performance that can be expected. The data used in preparing this case history was taken from reports published by the New Mexico Oil and Gas Engineering Committee.