The first successful fieldwide application of intelligent completion technology in Total worldwide has been installed in Al Khalij field wells. The Al Khalij field, located offshore Qatar, was discovered in 1991 and put into production in 1997. The field is formed of a highly heterogeneous carbonate reservoir with significant remaining dynamic uncertainties, making reservoir management a challenge. Moreover, given the currently high field water cut (WCT = +/- 90%), any operation to decrease it, without a detrimental impact on the productivity, can have a large impact on its oil potential.

The standard Al Khalij oil producer well architecture has around 3,000 m of horizontal drain across the reservoir, of which half is completed on 7-in or 6 5/8-in cemented and perforated liner, and half is a 6-in or 5 3/4-in openhole extension. All the oil producer wells are lifted with electrical submersible pumps (dual ESP standard). Since 2007, Total E&P Qatar started deploying intelligent wells for reservoir zonal control, monitoring, and enhanced management. Currently 28 intelligent completions have been installed in the field, with a low misrun rate (1 out of 29). Such completions have allowed selective downhole flow control without any additional heavy intervention (i.e., shift sliding sleeves in horizontal well). In the years 2011 and 2012, for the first time in Total Group, a number of 3 flow control valves have been installed in two Al Khalij wells.

Given the ease of manipulating multiposition flow control valves, the Al Khalij intelligent completions can be manipulated regularly in order to acquire inflow information (low-cost PLT) and optimize the well behavior. In 2013, the control valves operations brought extra oil of up to +/-5% of the field production.

This paper details the design, planning, and execution of the intelligent completion technology in the Al Khalij field and covers the value generated for field development.