Market assessment - Development of an integrated software for complex flows of cement plug placement in oil wells abandonment (CemPA)

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Canada is entering an era when there are numerous oil and gas wells that need to be plugged and abandoned. This is to avoid oil and gas leakages to the surrounding environment, water aquifers, and atmosphere. In fact, we are heading towards a significant wave of plug and abandonment (P&A) of oil and gas wells. The P&A operations are carried out by placing a cement plug in the desired area of the wellbore. However, there are many wells that are not properly plugged, due to problems associated to the cement plug placement process, e.g. cement slurry contaminations. The improper P&A of wellbores may cause potential pathways for leakage that would need costly re-plugging processes. During the P&A process, the cement should displace and remove in-situ fluids, with minimum mixing and maximum removal efficiency. The problem complexities involve the effects of a large number of fluid physical properties, well geometries, and operational conditions. The design of these parameters needs to be managed using an integrated package to enhance the operation efficiency. The aim of this work is to conduct a market assessment for developing an innovative software, based on fluid mechanics concepts, that can analyze displacement flows during the cement plug placement and optimize P&A operations.