This paper presents an innovative application of the integrated-asset-model (IAM) approach to simulate a surface network collecting many complex fields and multiple constraints. The use of a last-generation high-resolution reservoir simulator (HRRS) made it possible to perform the reservoirs-network coupling directly by a field-manager (FM) process, which acts as an orchestrator for a variety of reservoirs and network-simulation instances. No third-party controller application was required because the FM of the HRRS directly managed the communication between the different reservoir models and the surface-network model.
Introduction
The ability to predict reservoir behavior has always played a fundamental role in the definition of a development project, and numerical simulation can be considered the first tool for a quantitative evaluation of reservoir performance. In the past decades, improvements in information technology have increased calculation capabilities, enabling development of dynamic simulators able to solve for more-complex reservoirs and dynamic processes.
