SIMULATIONS

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

[0001] This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application 61/384,557 filed September 20, 2010 entitled FLEXIBLE AND ADAPTIVE FORMULATIONS FOR COMPLEX RESERVOIR SIMULATIONS, the entirety of which is incorporated by reference herein.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

[0002] Disclosed aspects and methodologies relate to reservoir simulation, and more particularly, to methods of solving multiple fluid flow equations.

BACKGROUND

[0003] This section is intended to introduce various aspects of the art, which may be associated with aspects of the disclosed techniques and methodologies. A list of references is provided at the end of this section and may be referred to hereinafter. This discussion, including the references, is believed to assist in providing a framework to facilitate a better understanding of particular aspects of the disclosure. Accordingly, this section should be read in this light and not necessarily as admissions of prior art.

[0004] Reservoir simulators solve systems of equations describing the flow of oil, gas and water within subterranean formations. In a reservoir simulation model, the subterranean formation is mapped on to a two- or three-dimensional grid comprising a plurality of cells. Each cell has an associated equation set that describes the flow into the cell, the flow out of the cell, and the accumulation within the cell. For example, if the reservoir is divided into 1000 cells, there will be 1000 equation sets that need to be solved.

[0005] To model the time-varying nature of fluid flow in a hydrocarbon reservoir, the solution of the equations to be solved on the grid cells varies over time. In the reservoir simulator, solutions are determined at discrete times. The time interval between solutions is called the timestep. For example, the reservoir simulator may calculate the pressures and saturations occurring at the end of a month, so the timestep is a month and a single solution to the equation set is needed. To calculate the changes in pressure and saturation over a year, the simulator in this example calculates twelve monthly solutions. The time spent solving this problem is roughly twelve times the time spent solving the single month problem.

[0006] The size of the timestep that a simulator can take depends on a number of factors. One factor is the numerical method employed to find the solution. As some reservoir models may have thousands or millions of cells, various methods have been proposed to efficiently solve the large number of equations to be solved by a reservoir simulation model. One known strategy for finding the solutions to these systems of equations is to use an iterative root- finding method. These methods find approximate solutions that get progressively closer to the true solution through iteration and solution updating. Newton's Method is one type of iterative root-finding method in general use. In Newton's Method, the set of simulation equations are cast into a form that makes the solution an exercise in finding the zeros of a function, i.e. finding x such that f(x) = 0.

[0007] Figure 1 is a graph 8 that depicts Newton's Method for a single equation. Curve 10 is the function f(x). What is sought is the value x where f(x) = 0, indicated by point 12. The initial guess is xo. The second guess is calculated by taking the line 14 tangent to f(x) at x ₀ and applying the formula Χ] Here f'(x) denotes the derivative of the function f(x) and is the slope of the tangent line at x. The third guess, ¾ uses the line 16 tangent at the second guess {xi) and applies the same formula, x ₂ = xi-(f(xi)/f'(xi)). Continuing this iterative algorithm one can get very close to the root off(x), i.e., point 12, in a modest number of iterations. If the curve f(x) is well-behaved, quadratic convergence can be achieved.

[0008] Reservoir simulators have expanded Newton's Method to solve for the many thousands of equations at each timestep. Instead of one equation a system of equations is used:

[Equation 1] where fi(xi, ..., x _n ) = 0 are the reservoir simulation equations for grid block 1 containing the variables xi through x _n , and n is the number of grid cells. The variables, xi, x„, are typically pressures and saturations at each cell.

[0009] To apply Newton's method to this system of equations the tangent of the function is needed at each iteration, like that described above for the single equation above. The tangent of this matrix A is called the Jacobian J and is composed of the derivatives of the functions with respect to the unknowns.

[Equation 2]

[0010] As in the case with one equation an initial guess x ₀ is made, where x ₀ is a vector of solutions. Each subsequent guess is formed in the same manner as that for a single variable, where x. is formed from from the previous guess x _M using the following equation:

Xi = i-i - (f(¼_i )/J(¼_i )) [Equation 3]

This equation can be rewritten as

J(¼_i ) & - i-i ) = ) [Equation 4] which is a matrix equation of the form Ax = b . The solution is thought to be converged when either the term (x. - 3e _M ) or - f(¾) approaches zero, i.e. is below a small threshold, epsilon

(ε). This idea is applied to each of the thousands or millions of cells over hundreds of timesteps in a reservoir simulator.

[0011] Figure 2 is a flowchart 20 showing the steps of Newton's Method for a system of equations. At block 21, a solution vector χ. , representing the solutions for the system of equations, is set to an initial guess x ₀ . At block 22 a Jacobian Matrix J _z and a vector b _i is constructed for all cells Z _n , or equation sets associated with the cells, using the solution vector x _i . At block 23 a new solution estimate x _n is obtained for all cells Z _n . At block 24 it is determined how many cells are not converged, which may be defined as having associated equation sets that have not satisfied a convergence criterion. If the number of unconverging cells is zero, then at block 25 the method stops. However, if at block 26 it is determined that the number of unconverging cells is not zero, then at block 27 the solution guess vector x\ is set to the new solution estimate x _n , and the process returns to block 22. The method repeats until all cells are converged. At that point the system of equations may be considered solved. [0012] While the Newton's Method provides a simple way to iteratively solve for solutions to systems of nonlinear equations, its effectiveness is lessened when the equations in a system of equations do not uniformly converge. For example, a two-dimensional grid 30 is shown in Figures 3 A, 3B, 3C, and 3D as having 169 cells. Each cell has an equation or equation set associated therewith. Prior to any iteration (Figure 3 A) the 169 equations are used as inputs to Newton's Method. After one iteration of Newton's Method (Figure 3B) the equations related to 1 1 1 cells have converged (shown by the lighter-colored cells 32). In other words, some areas of the reservoir have found solutions such that the term (x _t - _M ) is below ε for those areas. The unconverged cells are shown as darker colored cells 34. The second iteration (Figure 3C) uses all 169 equations, and the equations related to 147 cells have converged thereafter (as indicated by reference number 36). After the third iteration (Figure 3D) - which also uses all 169 equations- is completed, all equations have converged. This example highlights a drawback of Newton's Method: even though most equations have converged to a solution after a single iteration, Newton's Method uses the equations for all cells for all iterations. In other words, the size of the system of equations to be solved does not change after each iteration. For a large two- or three-dimensional reservoir simulation grid having thousands or millions of cells, the time and computational power required to perform Newton's Method repeatedly may be prohibitive.

[0013] In general, the linear system constructed by Newton's method is very large and expensive to solve for typical reservoir simulation models with complex geological structures and difficult physical properties. While maintaining numerical stability, fully implicit schemes employing the Newton's Method require substantial CPU time and a large memory footprint. More explicit schemes are cheaper in CPU time per timestep, but have difficulty taking viable time steps with reasonable sizes, given their stability limits. The Adaptive Implicit Method (AIM) is a natural choice to balance implicitness/stability and CPU/memory footprint. The basic concept of AIM is to combine multiple formulations with different degrees of implicitness. Therefore, the simulation can use a fully implicit formulation (e.g., solving pressure and saturations at the same time) to maintain unconditional stability for cells with constraining stability, while using cheaper and more explicit formulations (e.g., solving pressure only, explicitly updating saturation solutions afterwards) for the remainder of the reservoir. This type of strategy is known as IMplicit Pressure Explicit Saturation (IMPES). AIM reduces the size of the Jacobian matrix without sacrificing the numerical stability and timestep sizes. AIM relies heavily on robust stability estimation and prediction to determine how to distribute reservoir simulation cells into different formulations, i.e., potentially unstable cells in the implicit region, and less stable cells in the explicit region.

[0014] Figures 4A-4C show an example of how the Adaptive Implicit Method may be applied in a reservoir simulator. A 17x17 reservoir simulation grid 40 is depicted at a particular timestep, demonstrating a five-spot water injection pattern with a water injector at the upper-left corner 41 and a producer at the lower-right corner 42. Figure 4 A is the map of water saturation at the given timestep with arrow 43 indicating the direction of the water front movement. The degree of shading of each cell indicates the amount of water saturation therein. Figure 4B graphically illustrates relative stability at each cell at the beginning of the timestep with shaded cells 44 denoted as unstable. These cells 44 are assigned to be solved implicitly. The stability of each cell will be recalculated at the end of the timestep, which is shown in Figure 4C. As the water front moves during the timestep, the stability at each cell may change, and this is shown in Figure 4C as a different group of cells 45 being denoted as unstable. This group of unstable cells 45 is assigned to be solved implicitly for the next timestep.

[0015] A typical AIM scheme will preset the implicit/explicit formulations at the beginning of each timestep using the stability information calculated from previous timestep. Although the reservoir model contains multiple formulations, the formulation on any given cell will remain the same throughout the timestep, This approach has a few potential issues. First, all the stability criteria have been derived from linearized systems. For highly nonlinear systems, the stability criteria are not very robust and reliable, e.g., as in thermal recovery processes. Second, the stability limits are calculated at the beginning of each timestep. The situation often arises that a cell was stable according to the stability calculation and put into the explicit region, but by the end of the timestep the cell is not stable any more because of the nonlinear nature of the problem, as shown in Figures 4B-4C. For example, one of the commonly used stability criteria is expressed as the CFL (Courant-Friedrichs-Lewy) number, and the stability condition for IMPES formulation is CFL < 1. In a simplified two-phase oil- water simulation model, the CFL number can be expressed as

_{CFL =} q _∑ A _i dFJ _: S [Equation s]

V _p dS _w where At is the timestep size, q _T At/ V _p the volumetric throughput, and F _W (S _W ) is the fractional flow, which is a function of water saturation S _w according to F _W (S _W ) =—^— [Equation 6] where A _w , λ ₀ are water and oil mobility respectively. If a cell has a low CFL number (less than 1, for example) at a given timestep, it is assumed that cell is stable, and an explicit formulation is used to solve the flow equations at that timestep. If a cell has a high CFL number (greater than 1, for example) at a given timestep, it is assumed the cell is unstable, and an implicit formulation is used to solve the flow equations at the timestep. Figure 5 shows a graphic representation of how the CFL number is calculated for a simulation cell. F _W '(S _W ) is the derivative of the function F _W (S _W ) 50 which is the slope of the tangent line at any given point. With a given timestep size and fixed volumetric throughput, the CFL number is proportional to this derivative as expressed in Equation 5. The fractional flow F _wl (S _wl ) at the beginning of the timestep (with water saturation S _wl ) has a CFL number just within the stability bound, represented by the relatively flat slope of tangent line 51 , and dictates an explicit formulation. The fractional flow F _w2 (S _w2 ) at the end of the timestep (with water saturation S _w2 ) has a CFL number much larger than the stability bound, represented by the steep slope of tangent line 52, and may cause a numerical stability issue.

[0016] Several strategies may be used to remedy this stability issue, but each strategy imposes unwanted costs on the simulation. A conservative CFL limit may be used, but this may impose a more stringent timestep constraint on the simulation run, or distribute too many simulation cells into the implicit formulation. The timestep may be rerun with the unstable cells being switched to the implicit formulation, but for large and highly nonlinear systems this approach will inevitably incur unnecessary calculations and slow down the simulation. A timestep cut could be triggered to satisfy the stability limit, but this would increase the number of calculations to solve the simulation. Finally, a small amount of unstable cells may be permitted to be run in the simulation, assuming that the local instability will dissipate and disappear eventually. This approach sacrifices numerical stability for simulation runtime performance.

[0017] Another potential inefficiency of the AIM method could be aggravated if a conservative CFL limit is used. A cell might require a fully implicit scheme at the beginning of a timestep. However, the particular cell could quickly converge to a solution that is well within the stability limit. As Figure 5 shows, the CFL number at the end of another timestep (with water saturation S _w3 ), represented by the relatively flat slope of tangent line 53 could be much lower than the beginning of the timestep (with water saturation S _w2 ), represented by the steep slope of tangent line 52. Assigning the associated simulation cell to an implicit formulation scheme will likely over-constrain either the timestep size or the computational scheme.

[0018] Various attempts have been made to reduce the time required to solve a system of equations using implicit or adaptive implicit methods. Examples of these attempts are found in the following: U.S. Patent Nos. 6,662,146, 6,052,520, 7,526,418, 7,286,972, and 6,230,101; U.S. Patent Application No. 2009/0055141; "Krylov- Secant Methods for Accelerating the Solution of Fully Implicit Formulations" (SPE Journal, Paper No. 00092863); "Adaptively-Localized-Continuation-Newton: Reservoir Simulation Nonlinear Solvers that Converge All the Time" (SPE Journal, Paper No. 119147); "Preconditioned Newton Methods for Fully Coupled Reservoir and Surface Facility Models" (SPE Journal, Paper No. 00049001); Gai, et al, "A Timestepping Scheme for Coupled Reservoir Flow and Geomechanics on Nonmatching Grids" (SPE Journal, Paper No. 97054); Lu, et al, "Iteratively Coupled Reservoir Simulation for Multiphase Flow" (SPE Journal, Paper No. 110114); and Mosqueda, et al., "Combined Implicit or Explicit Integration Steps for Hybrid Simulation", Earthquake Engineering and Structural Dynamics, vol. 36 no. 15, pp 2325-2343 (2007). While each of these proposed methods may reduce the time necessary to solve a system of equations, none of the methods reduce the number of equations (or cells) required to be solved using an implicit method employing Newton's Method. Furthermore, none of the references disclose a change in formulation method during a timestep. What is needed is a way to reduce the number of equations needed to be solved in successive iterations of an iterative solver.

SUMMARY

[0019] In one aspect, a method is provided for performing a simulation of a subsurface hydrocarbon reservoir. The reservoir is approximated by a reservoir model having a plurality of cells. Each cell has associated therewith an equation set representing a reservoir property. A stability limit is determined for each of the plurality of cells. Each cell is assigned to one of an explicit formulation or an implicit formulation. An initial guess is provided to a solution for a system of equations formed using the equation set for each cell in the plurality of cells. The initial guess is used to solve for a solution to the system of equations using an explicit formulation for cells assigned thereto and an implicit formulation for cells assigned thereto. A list of unconverged cells is established. The unconverged cells have equation sets that have not satisfied a convergence criterion. A stability limit is calculated for each of the converged cells. The converged cells have equation sets that have satisfied the convergence criterion. When the number of unconverged cells is greater than a predetermined amount, a reduced nonlinear system is constructed with the list of unconverged cells. The reduced nonlinear system is assigned to be solved with the implicit formulation, and other cells are assigned to be solved with the explicit formulation. The using, establishing, calculating and constructing parts of the method are repeated, substituting the solved solution for the initial guess or the most recent solved solution and substituting the equation sets corresponding to the cells in the list of unconverged cells for the system of equations or equation sets from the most recent iteration, until all equation sets satisfy the convergence criterion and a stability criterion. When all equation sets satisfy the convergence criterion and the stability criterion, the solved solution is output as a result for a timestep of a simulation of the subsurface reservoir.

[0020] According to disclosed methodologies and techniques, an iterative root-finding method may be used with the initial guess to solve for the solution to the system of equations. The iterative root- finding method may comprise Newton's Method. Converged cells with one or more reservoir properties exhibiting changes greater than a preset amount may be added to the list of unconverged cells. Converged cells that do not satisfy the stability criterion may be added to the list of unconverged cells. Any cell that is neighbor to a cell in the list of unconverged cells and that does not satisfy the stability criterion may be added to the list of unconverged cells. The number of neighbor cells may be between 1 and N-W, where N is the number of the plurality of cells in the reservoir model and W is the number of cells having equation sets that satisfy the convergence criterion. Any cell that is neighbor to a cell in the list of unconverged cells and that does satisfy the stability criterion may be assigned to be solved using the explicit formulation. The reservoir property may be at least one of fluid pressure, fluid saturation, and fluid flow. Some or all of the method may be performed using a computer. Outputting the solved solution may include displaying the solved solution. The predetermined amount may be zero. A post-Newton material balance corrector may be employed when all equation sets satisfy the convergence criterion and the stability criterion. The post-Newton material balance corrector may employ an explicit molar update or total volumetric flux conservation. [0021] According to other methodologies and techniques, the timestep of the simulation of the subsurface reservoir may be a first timestep, and some or all of the method may be repeated at additional timesteps. The solved solutions for the first timestep and the additional timesteps may be outputted. The solved solutions may simulate the subsurface reservoir over time.

[0022] In another aspect, a method is disclosed for performing a simulation of a subsurface hydrocarbon reservoir. The reservoir is approximated by a reservoir model having a plurality of cells. Each cell has associated therewith an equation set representing a reservoir property including at least one of fluid pressure, saturation, and fluid flow. A stability limit is determined for each of the plurality of cells. Each cell is assigned to an explicit formulation or an implicit formulation. An initial guess is provided to a solution for a system of equations formed using the equation set for each cell in the plurality of cells. The initial guess is used to solve for a solution to the system of equations using an explicit formulation for cells assigned thereto and an implicit formulation for cells assigned thereto. A list of unconverged cells is established. The unconverged cells have equation sets that have not satisfied a convergence criterion. A stability limit is calculated for each of the converged cells. The converged cells have equation sets that have satisfied the convergence criterion. When the number of unconverged cells is greater than a predetermined amount, the following are added to the list of unconverged cells: converged cells with one or more reservoir properties exhibiting changes greater than a preset amount; converged cells that do not satisfy the stability criterion; and any cell that is neighbor to a cell in the list of unconverged cells and that does not satisfy the stability criterion. A reduced nonlinear system is constructed with the list of unconverged cells. The reduced nonlinear system is assigned to be solved with the implicit formulation. Other cells are assigned to be solved with the explicit formulation. The using, establishing, calculating, and adding parts of the method are repeated, substituting the solved solution for the initial guess or the most recent solved solution and substituting the equation sets corresponding to the cells in the list of unconverged cells for the system of equations or equation sets from the most recent iteration, until all equation sets satisfy the convergence criterion and a stability criterion. When all equation sets satisfy the convergence criterion and the stability criterion, the solved solution is outputted as a result for a timestep of a simulation of the subsurface reservoir.

[0023] According to disclosed methodologies and techniques, part or all of the method may be repeated at additional timesteps, and the solved solutions for the first timestep and the additional timesteps may be outputted as a simulation of the subsurface reservoir over time. A post-Newton material balance corrector may be employed when all equation sets satisfy the convergence criterion and the stability criterion.

[0024] In another aspect, a computer program product is provided having computer executable logic recorded on a tangible, machine readable medium. Code is provided for determining a stability limit for each of a plurality of cells in a reservoir model that approximates a subsurface hydrocarbon reservoir. Each cell has associated therewith an equation set representing a reservoir property. Code is provided for assigning each cell to an explicit formulation or an implicit formulation. Code is provided for providing an initial guess to a solution for a system of equations formed using the equation set for each cell in the plurality of cells. Code is provided for using the initial guess to solve for a solution to the system of equations using an explicit formulation for cells assigned thereto and an implicit formulation for cells assigned thereto. Code is provided for establishing a list of unconverged cells. The unconverged cells have equation sets that have not satisfied a convergence criterion. Code is provided for calculating a stability limit for each of the converged cells. The converged cells have equation sets that have satisfied the convergence criterion. Code is provided for constructing a reduced nonlinear system with the list of unconverged cells when the number of unconverged cells is greater than a predetermined amount. The reduced nonlinear system is assigned to be solved with the implicit formulation, and other cells are assigned to be solved with the explicit formulation. Code is provided for repeating the using, establishing, calculating, and constructing parts of the code, substituting the solved solution for the initial guess or the most recent solved solution and substituting the equation sets corresponding to the cells in the list of unconverged cells for the system of equations or equation sets from the most recent iteration, until all equation sets satisfy the convergence criterion and a stability criterion. Code is provided for outputting the solved solution as a result for a timestep of a simulation of the subsurface reservoir when all equation sets satisfy the convergence criterion and the stability criterion.

[0025] According to disclosed methodologies and techniques, code may be provided for adding the following to the list of unconverged cells when the number of unconverged cells is greater than a predetermined amount: converged cells with one or more reservoir properties exhibiting changes greater than a preset amount; converged cells that do not satisfy the stability criterion; and any cell that is neighbor to a cell in the list of unconverged cells and that does not satisfy the stability criterion. Code may be provided for repeating some or all of the code at additional timesteps. The solved solutions for the first timestep and the additional timesteps may be outputted. The solved solutions may simulate the subsurface reservoir over time.

[0026] In still another aspect, a method is provided for managing hydrocarbon resources. A subsurface hydrocarbon reservoir is approximated with a reservoir model having a plurality of cells. Each cell has an associated equation set that represents a reservoir property. A stability limit is determined for each of the plurality of cells. Each cell is assigned to an explicit formulation or an implicit formulation. An initial guess is provided to a solution for a system of equations formed using the equation set for each cell in the plurality of cells. The initial guess is used to solve for a solution to the system of equations using an explicit formulation for cells assigned thereto and an implicit formulation for cells assigned thereto. A list of unconverged cells is established. The unconverged cells have equation sets that have not satisfied a convergence criterion. A stability limit is calculated for each of the converged cells. The converged cells have equation sets that have satisfied the convergence criterion. When the number of unconverged cells is greater than a predetermined amount, a reduced nonlinear system is constructed with the list of unconverged cells, the reduced nonlinear system being assigned to be solved with the implicit formulation and other cells being assigned to be solved with the explicit formulation. The using, establishing, calculating, and constructing steps are repeated, substituting the solved solution for the initial guess or the most recent solved solution and substituting the equation sets corresponding to the cells in the list of unconverged cells for the system of equations or equation sets from the most recent iteration, until all equation sets satisfy the convergence criterion and a stability criterion. When all equation sets satisfy the convergence criterion and the stability criterion, the solved solution is outputted as a result of a timestep of a simulation of the subsurface reservoir. Hydrocarbon resources are managed using the simulation of the subsurface reservoir.

[0027] According to disclosed methodologies and techniques, the simulated characteristic may be fluid flow in the subsurface reservoir. Managing hydrocarbons may include extracting hydrocarbons from the subsurface reservoir.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0028] The foregoing and other advantages of the present invention may become apparent upon reviewing the following detailed description and drawings of non-limiting examples of embodiments in which: [0029] Figure 1 is a graph demonstrating the known Newton's Method;

[0030] Figure 2 is a flowchart showing steps used in executing the known Newton's Method;

[0031] Figures 3A, 3B, 3C and 3D are schematic diagrams showing convergence of a system of equations using the known Newton's Method;

[0032] Figures 4A, 4B and 4C are schematic diagrams showing how the Adaptive Implicit Method may be used in solving a fluid flow simulation;

[0033] Figure 5 is a graph demonstrating changes in stability calculations at different times in a timestep;

[0034] Figure 6 is a graph demonstrating a strategy for performing an adaptive iterative equation solving method;

[0035] Figure 7 is a flowchart of an Adaptive Newton's Method;

[0036] Figures 8A, 8B, 8C, and 8D are schematic diagrams showing convergence of a system of equations using the Adaptive Newton's Method;

[0037] Figure 9 is a flowchart of a flexible and adaptive method according to disclosed methodologies and techniques;

[0038] Figures 10A, 10B, IOC, 10D, and 10E are schematic diagrams showing convergence of a system of equations using the flexible and adaptive method according to disclosed methodologies and techniques;

[0039] Figure 11 is a graph comparing performance of various implicit formulations;

[0040] Figure 12 is a schematic diagram showing a cell selection strategy according to disclosed methodologies and techniques;

[0041] Figure 13 is a flowchart of a method according to disclosed methodologies and techniques;

[0042] Figure 14 is another flowchart of a method according to disclosed methodologies and techniques;

[0043] Figure 15 is a block diagram illustrating a computer environment;

[0044] Figure 16 is a block diagram of machine-readable code;

[0045] Figure 17 is a side elevational view of a hydrocarbon management activity; and [0046] Figure 18 is a flowchart of a method of extracting hydrocarbons from a subsurface region.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0047] To the extent the following description is specific to a particular embodiment or a particular use, this is intended to be illustrative only and is not to be construed as limiting the scope of the invention. On the contrary, it is intended to cover all alternatives, modifications, and equivalents that may be included within the spirit and scope of the invention.

[0048] Some portions of the detailed description which follows are presented in terms of procedures, steps, logic blocks, processing and other symbolic representations of operations on data bits within a memory in a computing system or a computing device. These descriptions and representations are the means used by those skilled in the data processing arts to most effectively convey the substance of their work to others skilled in the art. In this detailed description, a procedure, step, logic block, process, or the like, is conceived to be a self-consistent sequence of steps or instructions leading to a desired result. The steps are those requiring physical manipulations of physical quantities. Usually, although not necessarily, these quantities take the form of electrical, magnetic, or optical signals capable of being stored, transferred, combined, compared, and otherwise manipulated. It has proven convenient at times, principally for reasons of common usage, to refer to these signals as bits, values, elements, symbols, characters, terms, numbers, or the like.

[0049] Unless specifically stated otherwise as apparent from the following discussions, terms such as "determining", "assigning", "providing", "using", "solving", "establishing", "calculating", "constructing", "substituting", "adding", "repeating", "outputting", "employing", "estimating", "identifying", "iterating", "running", "approximating", "simulating", "displaying", or the like, may refer to the action and processes of a computer system, or other electronic device, that transforms data represented as physical (electronic, magnetic, or optical) quantities within some electrical device's storage into other data similarly represented as physical quantities within the storage, or in transmission or display devices. These and similar terms are to be associated with the appropriate physical quantities and are merely convenient labels applied to these quantities.

[0050] Embodiments disclosed herein also relate to an apparatus for performing the operations herein. This apparatus may be specially constructed for the required purposes, or it may comprise a general-purpose computer selectively activated or reconfigured by a computer program or code stored in the computer. Such a computer program or code may be stored or encoded in a computer readable medium or implemented over some type of transmission medium. A computer-readable medium includes any medium or mechanism for storing or transmitting information in a form readable by a machine, such as a computer ('machine' and 'computer' are used synonymously herein). As a non-limiting example, a computer-readable medium may include a computer-readable storage medium (e.g., read only memory ("ROM"), random access memory ("RAM"), magnetic disk storage media, optical storage media, flash memory devices, etc.). A transmission medium may be twisted wire pairs, coaxial cable, optical fiber, or some other suitable transmission medium, for transmitting signals such as electrical, optical, acoustical or other form of propagated signals (e.g., carrier waves, infrared signals, digital signals, etc.)).

[0051] Furthermore, modules, features, attributes, methodologies, and other aspects can be implemented as software, hardware, firmware or any combination thereof. Wherever a component of the invention is implemented as software, the component can be implemented as a standalone program, as part of a larger program, as a plurality of separate programs, as a statically or dynamically linked library, as a kernel loadable module, as a device driver, and/or in every and any other way known now or in the future to those of skill in the art of computer programming. Additionally, the invention is not limited to implementation in any specific operating system or environment.

[0052] Example methods may be better appreciated with reference to flow diagrams. While for purposes of simplicity of explanation, the illustrated methodologies are shown and described as a series of blocks, it is to be appreciated that the methodologies are not limited by the order of the blocks, as some blocks can occur in different orders and/or concurrently with other blocks from that shown and described. Moreover, less than all the illustrated blocks may be required to implement an example methodology. Blocks may be combined or separated into multiple components. Furthermore, additional and/or alternative methodologies can employ additional blocks not shown herein. While the figures illustrate various actions occurring serially, it is to be appreciated that various actions could occur in series, substantially in parallel, and/or at substantially different points in time.

[0053] Various terms as used herein are defined below. To the extent a term used in a claim is not defined below, it should be given the broadest possible definition persons in the pertinent art have given that term as reflected in at least one printed publication or issued patent.

[0054] As used herein, "and/or" placed between a first entity and a second entity means one of (1) the first entity, (2) the second entity, and (3) the first entity and the second entity. Multiple elements listed with "and/or" should be construed in the same fashion, i.e., "one or more" of the elements so conjoined.

[0055] As used herein, "cell" is a subdivision of a grid, for example, a reservoir simulation grid. Cells may be two-dimensional or three-dimensional. Cells may be any shape, according to how the grid is defined.

[0056] As used herein, "displaying" includes a direct act that causes displaying, as well as any indirect act that facilitates displaying. Indirect acts include providing software to an end user, maintaining a website through which a user is enabled to affect a display, hyperlinking to such a website, or cooperating or partnering with an entity who performs such direct or indirect acts. Thus, a first party may operate alone or in cooperation with a third party vendor to enable the reference signal to be generated on a display device. The display device may include any device suitable for displaying the reference image, such as without limitation a CRT monitor, a LCD monitor, a plasma device, a flat panel device, or printer. The display device may include a device which has been calibrated through the use of any conventional software intended to be used in evaluating, correcting, and/or improving display results (e.g., a color monitor that has been adjusted using monitor calibration software). Rather than (or in addition to) displaying the reference image on a display device, a method, consistent with the invention, may include providing a reference image to a subject. "Providing a reference image" may include creating or distributing the reference image to the subject by physical, telephonic, or electronic delivery, providing access over a network to the reference, or creating or distributing software to the subject configured to run on the subject's workstation or computer including the reference image. In one example, the providing of the reference image could involve enabling the subject to obtain the reference image in hard copy form via a printer. For example, information, software, and/or instructions could be transmitted (e.g., electronically or physically via a data storage device or hard copy) and/or otherwise made available (e.g., via a network) in order to facilitate the subject using a printer to print a hard copy form of reference image. In such an example, the printer may be a printer which has been calibrated through the use of any conventional software intended to be used in evaluating, correcting, and/or improving printing results (e.g., a color printer that has been adjusted using color correction software).

[0057] As used herein, "exemplary" is used exclusively herein to mean "serving as an example, instance, or illustration." Any aspect described herein as "exemplary" is not necessarily to be construed as preferred or advantageous over other aspects.

[0058] As used herein, "hydrocarbon reservoirs" include reservoirs containing any hydrocarbon substance, including for example one or more than one of any of the following: oil (often referred to as petroleum), natural gas, gas condensate, tar and bitumen.

[0059] As used herein, "hydrocarbon management" or "managing hydrocarbons" includes hydrocarbon extraction, hydrocarbon production, hydrocarbon exploration, identifying potential hydrocarbon resources, identifying well locations, determining well injection and/or extraction rates, identifying reservoir connectivity, acquiring, disposing of and/or abandoning hydrocarbon resources, reviewing prior hydrocarbon management decisions, and any other hydrocarbon-related acts or activities.

[0060] As used herein, "implicit function" is a mathematical rule or function which permits computation of one variable directly from another when an equation relating both variables is given. For example, y is an implicit function of x in the equation x +3y + xy = 0.

[0061] As used herein, "machine-readable medium" refers to a medium that participates in directly or indirectly providing signals, instructions and/or data. A machine-readable medium may take forms, including, but not limited to, non-volatile media (e.g. ROM, disk) and volatile media (RAM). Common forms of a machine -readable medium include, but are not limited to, a floppy disk, a flexible disk, a hard disk, a magnetic tape, other magnetic medium, a CD-ROM, other optical medium, a RAM, a ROM, an EPROM, a FLASH- EPROM, EEPROM, or other memory chip or card, a memory stick, and other media from which a computer, a processor or other electronic device can read.

[0062] In the context of cell location, "neighbor" means adjacent or nearby.

[0063] As used herein, "subsurface" means beneath the top surface of any mass of land at any elevation or over a range of elevations, whether above, below or at sea level, and/or beneath the floor surface of any mass of water, whether above, below or at sea level.

[0064] Example methods may be better appreciated with reference to flow diagrams. While for purposes of simplicity of explanation, the illustrated methodologies are shown and described as a series of blocks, it is to be appreciated that the methodologies are not limited by the order of the blocks, as some blocks can occur in different orders and/or concurrently with other blocks from that shown and described. Moreover, less than all the illustrated blocks may be required to implement an example methodology. Blocks may be combined or separated into multiple components. Furthermore, additional and/or alternative methodologies can employ additional blocks not shown herein. While the figures illustrate various actions occurring serially, it is to be appreciated that various actions could occur in series, substantially in parallel, and/or at substantially different points in time.

Adaptive Newton 's Method

[0065] Another method for solving systems of equations is described in United States Patent Application No. 61/265,103 entitled "Adaptive Newton's Method For Reservoir Simulation" filed November 30, 2009 and having common inventors herewith, said application being incorporated by reference herein in its entirety for all purposes. Portions of the disclosure of Application No. 61/265,103 are provided herein.

[0066] An iterative root-finding method such as Newton's Method characterizes the system of simulation equations into a form that makes the solution an exercise in finding the zeros of a function, i.e. finding x such that f(x) = 0. It is observed that in reservoir simulators the convergence behavior of Newton's Method is non-uniform through the reservoir grid. Some parts of the reservoir grid converge (i.e., the term( . - _M ) is below ε) in a single iteration while other parts of the reservoir grid require many iterative steps to converge. The standard Newton's Method requires that equations for the entire reservoir grid system are solved at each iteration, regardless whether parts of the reservoir have already converged. A method may be provided to adaptively target an iterative method like Newton's Method to only a portion of the reservoir cells while not losing the effectiveness of the convergence method.

[0067] More specifically, it is noted that portions of a reservoir simulation domain are relatively easy to solve while other areas are relatively hard to solve. Typical reservoir simulation models involve the injection or production of fluid at specific locations. It is the areas around these injection/production locations that the hard solutions typically appear. This leads to the variability in the solution characteristics in a reservoir simulator. Applying standard methods that apply the same technique to all areas of the reservoirs will suffer from a "weakest link" phenomenon, i.e. the solution method will apply the same amount of effort in solving in the problem in the easy and hard areas, thereby leading to overwork on the total solution.

[0068] The adaptive Newton's method takes advantage of the extremely non-uniform convergence behavior found in reservoir simulation datasets. Figure 6 is a graph 60 showing a graphic representation of the Adaptive Newton Method. The true solution that the reservoir simulator seeks to find at a particular time is given by the solid line 62. The initial guess 63 is relatively far from the true solution everywhere. Two iterations of an iterative solution method, such as Newton's Method, are shown by dashed lines 65, 66. Conventional application of an iterative solution method to reservoir simulators seeks to find the solution along the entire x-axis. The Adaptive Newton's Method uses knowledge of the previous iterative method only to continue to work in a subset of the modeled domain (the x-axis). This subset is the part of the solution space furthest from the true solution and is shown by the area 61. The Adaptive Newton's Method attempts no solutions in areas outside of area 61 as those areas have already converged.

[0069] Figure 7 is a flowchart of the Adaptive Newton's Method 70 that may be used to perform a simulation of a subsurface hydrocarbon reservoir. The reservoir may be approximated by a reservoir model, which has a plurality of cells. Each cell has one or more equations (an equation set) characterizing one or more reservoir properties, such as fluid flow, in the cell. In this discussion the term "cell" may be used interchangeably with its associated equation set. At block 71 a solution vector x _i , representing the solutions for the system of equations, is set to an initial guess ₀ . The number of cells to solve, ¾ is set to the total number of cells Z _n . At block 72 a Jacobian Matrix J _z and a vector b _t are constructed for all cells using the solution vector x _i . At block 73 a new solution estimate x _n is obtained for cells Zj. At block 74 it is determined which cells Zu are unconverging, which may be defined as having associated equation sets that have not satisfied a convergence criterion ε. If the number of unconverging cells is zero, then at block 75 the method stops. However, if at block 76 it is determined that the number of unconverging cells is not zero, then at block 77a the neighbors Z _i2 of the unconverged cells Zu are found. At block 77b a new list ¾ is created comprising the unconverged cells Zu and the neighbors Z _i2 . At block 77c the new list ¾ becomes the list of cells to proceed in the next iteration. The solution guess vector x _i is set to the new solution estimate x _n , and the process returns to block 72. The method repeats until no cells are unconverging. At that point the system of equations may be considered solved.

[0070] In the iterative loop of the known Newton's Method (Figure 2) the number of grid cells used to construct the Jacobian matrix J and the residual vector b _i is constant for every iteration. In the Adaptive Newton's Method (Figure 7), only those cells where the solution has yet to be found, and their converged neighbor cells, are used in subsequent updates of the

Jacobian matrix J and the residual vector b _t . As a result, the size of the Jacobian matrix J and the vector b _t may vary with each iteration, and ideally will be much smaller than the fixed- sized Jacobian matrix J and b _i used with known methods. The successively smaller size of the systems of equations used by the adaptive approach means less computational resources and time are required to run a reservoir simulation when compared with known methods.

[0071] Figures 8A, 8B, 8C and 8D depict a two-dimensional 13-by-13 rectangular grid 80 similar to the grid 30 shown in Figures 3A-3D. Each cell in grid 80 has an equation set associated therewith. Prior to any iteration (Figure 8 A) the 169 equation sets are used as inputs to the Adaptive Newton's Method. After one iteration of the Adaptive Newton's Method (Figure 8B) the equation sets associated with 111 cells have converged (shown by the lighter-colored cells 82 and 83). In other words, some areas of the reservoir have found solutions such that the term ( . - 3e _M ) is below ε for those areas. The unconverged cells are shown as darker colored cells 84. Instead of using all 169 equations sets in the second iteration (Figure 8C), the Adaptive Newton's Method solves only for the unconverged equation sets (represented by cells 84) and the converged equation sets associated with the cells that neighbor cells 84 (in Figure 8B, cells 83), which together number 88. After the second iteration (Figure 8C) the equation sets associated with 147 cells have converged (cells 84 and 85) and the equation sets associated with 22 cells have not converged (cells 86). 39 equation sets (representing the number of unconverged cells 86 and their converged neighbor cells 85) are returned for a third iteration (Figure 8D). After the third iteration is completed all equation sets have converged. The decreasing number of equation sets to be solved at each iteration of the Adaptive Newton's Method results in a significant time and computational savings over known methods. Flexible and Adaptive Formulations

[0072] The limitations of fully implicit equation solving strategies such as the Newton's Method and the Adaptive Newton's Method have been discussed herein. It is observed that the degree of nonlinearity in the system and degree of implicitness required in reservoir simulators are nonuniform through the grid. Furthermore, the highly nonlinear region does not necessarily always require a high degree of implicitness. The disclosed aspects provide a method to integrate the described methods within a flexible and adaptive nonlinear formulation framework, in which the balance between stability and speed can be optimized such that simulation run time performance will be significantly improved. Figure 9 is a flowchart showing a method 90 according to disclosed aspects. At block 92 stability limits for each cell in a simulation model are calculated using, for example, the CFL number as previously discussed. Based on the calculated or predicted stability or on some predefined characteristic by a user, each cell is assigned or distributed to an implicit formulation or an explicit formulation. Specifically, relatively stable cells normally will be assigned to an explicit formulation, while relatively unstable cells normally will be assigned to an implicit formulation. When the cells have been assigned, at block 94 a solution vector χ. , representing the solutions for the system of equations, is set to an initial guess x ₀ . The number of cells to solve, Zi, is set to the total number of cells Z _n . At block 96 a Jacobian Matrix J _z and a vector b _; are constructed for all cells Z _l using the solution vector x. . At block 98 a new solution estimate x _n is obtained for cells Zj. At block 100 it is determined which cells Zn are not converged, which may be defined as having associated equation sets that have not satisfied a convergence criterion ε. A convergence map may be created that indicates the convergence status of each cell. At block 102 stability limits are calculated on converged cells and the neighbors, or boundary cells, of the converged cells. At block 104 it is determined if all cells have converged, which is true when ¾ = 0. At block 104 it is determined if all converged cells are stable. If so, the method stops at block 108.

[0073] If at block 104 it is determined some cells have not converged (i.e., when Z _n > 0), a reduced nonlinear system is constructed, which will be solved by an implicit formulation. The reduced system includes the non-converged cells discovered at block 100. In addition, at block 1 10 cells with large changes in pressure and saturation (beyond pre-set limits) are marked as non-converged and added to the reduced system. By marking these cells as non- converged, the method instructs these cells to be solved using an implicit formulation. At block 112 unstable converged cells are added to the reduced system. By being added to the non-converged cells the method instructs these cells to be solved using the implicit formulation. At block 114 the unstable neighbors Z# of the unconverged cells Zu are found. At block 116 a new list Z _i3 is created comprising the unconverged cells Z and the neighbors Zi2. At block 118 stable neighbors are set to be solved using explicit formulation. At block 120 the convergence map is recalculated because at block 122 the new list Za becomes the list of cells to proceed in the next iteration. The solution guess vector x _i is set to the new solution estimate x _n , and the process returns to block 96. The method repeats until no cells are non-converged and unstable. At that point the system of equations may be considered solved. Even if all cells have converged (block 104), if not all cells are stable (block 106) the method goes to block 112, where unstable converged cells are marked as unconverged and become the reduced nonlinear system. The method repeats with this reduced system until all cells are solved and stable.

[0074] Figures 10A, 10B, IOC, 10D and 10E show an example of the flexible and adaptive formulation as applied in a reservoir simulator according to disclosed methodologies and techniques. As with the Adaptive Newton's method, a rectangular grid 130 is presented here but the method is applicable to any type of grid. Figures 10A-10E depicts a 13 x 13 reservoir simulation grid at a particular timestep. At the beginning of the iterative cycle, as shown in Figure 10A, all grid cells are unconverged, denoted by a first level of shading 131.

The thirty cells to be solved using an implicit formulation, termed the implicit cells, are indicated by cross-hatching 132. As previously discussed the implicit cells are determined by stability criteria such as the CFL number. In the first iteration Newton's method is applied and the solution is updated. Figure 10B represents possible results where after the first iteration 111 cells have converged. The converged cells are shown as unshaded cells 133 and cells having a second level of shading 134. The cells having the second level of shading 134 are neighbors of unconverged cells 131. In this particular example, no formulation change is necessary after the first iteration because there are no converged unstable nodes at this point.

In the second iteration only the unconverged cells 131 and the neighbor cells 134 are used to calculate the next iterative results. A reduced system is solved on this second iteration with

88 active cells. Figure IOC represents possible results after the second iteration, where 147 cells have converged (unshaded cells 133 and cells with second level of shading 134).

However, the stability calculation dictates that certain cells become unstable at this iteration.

Instead of being solved by the explicit formulation, the converged unstable cells are marked as unconverged and switched to be solved using the implicit formulation. Correspondingly, the boundary cells are updated, as shown in Figure 10D. The change in unstable cells is also shown by the cross-hatching of cells at 135 in Figure 10D. This change also represents which cells are to be solved using an implicit formulation in the next iteration. At the beginning of the third iteration only 57 cells are used (unconverged cells 131 plus boundary cells 134) instead of 169 cells. In this hypothetical example all cells have converged after three iterations (Figure 10E) and the solution for that timestep has been found. The change in number and distribution of cross-hatched cells from Figure 10A to Figure 10E shows that the formulation distribution has changed from the beginning of the timestep to the end of the timestep.

[0075] Figure 11 shows the performance comparison between four different implicit formulation methods: the conventional Newton's method, the conventional AIM method, the Adaptive Newton's method, and the flexible and adaptive method disclosed herein. The methods are compared using the same hypothetical example as shown in Figure 10. In this example, it is assumed there are three unknowns per implicit cell and one unknown per explicit cell. All four methods take three Newton iterations to converge, though with different computational cost per iteration. In addition, the conventional AIM encounters some numerical stability issues at the end of the timestep and would need to take a timestep cut. By comparing the total number of equations solved by each method, it can be seen that the flexible and adaptive method disclosed herein can provide significant runtime savings over the other three methods.

[0076] The flexible and adaptive method disclosed herein is described as being used at each iteration. However, the smaller solution sets formed at later iterations could be solved by root-finding methods that are more efficient and more robust for the smaller sizes of equation sets, such as a combination of direct linear solver and robust (maybe more expensivie) nonlinear solver). Changing the size of the matrix as well as the type of method for each iteration is an additional variation.

[0077] As discussed previously, including cells bordering or neighboring converged cells helps the disclosed flexible and adaptive method work successfully. It is believed this is so because the border cells provide accurate boundary conditions to the unconverged cells. Previously disclosed aspects have used only one layer of neighbor cells, but in another aspect more than one layer of neighbors may be used. The number of layers are correlated with how the pressure wave propagates within the reservoir, which could be a function of reservoir properties and timestep sizes. The concept of "radius of investigation" can be employed within this context. As this would increase the number of equation sets to be solved at each iteration, some of the solving time otherwise saved would be lost. However, having two or more layers of neighbor cells might be useful in making the method more robust for very difficult problems. Figure 12 illustrates this idea with a 13-by-13 rectangular grid 140 similar to rectangular grid 130. On the second iteration of an iterative root solver such as the disclosed flexible and adaptive method, the nearest two neighbors 142 to each unconverged cell 144 are included in a subsequent iteration of the disclosed flexible and adaptive method. While this increases the number of equation sets to solve from 39 to 63, it still is significantly less than the known Newton's Method, which as demonstrated would use 169 equation sets in each iteration. In unusual cases the number of selected neighboring converged cells may be all of the converged cells, or alternatively may comprise a single converged cell. In other words the number of selected neighbor cells may be between 1 and N-W, where N is the total number of cells in the reservoir model and W is the number of cells having equation sets that satisfy the convergence criterion at the relevant iteration. Other strategies or methods to select the number and location of converged cells to be combined with unconverged cells are contemplated.

[0078] In another aspect, a post-Newton material balance correction/smoothing mechanism is disclosed. Because the global system is not solved at every iteration, some material balance errors or non-smoothness in the solution might be introduced. Among the possible approaches that can be used as a post-Newton smoother is known as an explicit molar update. Using the converged solution and updated reservoir properties on each cell, the molar fluxes on connections between cells can be calculated. The molar fluxes at each cell can be updated with

conn

) = K, - ∑U _m ⁿ [Equation 7]

j where N _m " is the moles for component m in cell i, At is a timestep size, and is the molar flux for component m between cell i and cell j with updated reservoir properties.

[0079] Another more sophisticated smoother is to use the idea of total volumetric flux conservation. With this scheme, the saturation correction can be computed while accounting for any material balance errors or volume discrepancies in the system. One specific form with the volume balance formulation is shown here:

[Equation 8]

[0080] In this equation, V _p f is pore volume, F _v " ⁺¹ is phase volume, S" is phase saturation, SS _{V i} is saturation correction, and the material balance errors and phase volume discrepancies are

conn

_{B+1 B+1} _ „ - _At Yu ⁿ⁺¹

7 [Equations 9 and 10]

[0081] The molar flux can be updated with the saturation correction term as phase-l l JT T

U L _j = U^ _j +∑ ∑ — SS _V , [Equation 11]

[0082] Figure 13 is a flowchart showing a method 90a similar to the method shown in Figure 9. Method 90a additionally employs a post-Newton material balance corrector. If at blocks 104 and 106 it is determined that the number of unconverging cells is zero or substantially zero and that all cells are stable, then at block 123 a post-Newton material balance corrector is employed as previously discussed. Once the material balance is corrected, at block 108 the method stops or ends.

[0083] Although methodologies and techniques described herein have used rectangular grids for demonstration purposes, grids of any size, type, or shape may be used with the disclosed aspects.

[0084] Figure 14 is a flowchart showing a method 150 of performing a simulation of a subsurface hydrocarbon reservoir according to aspects described herein. At block 152 a model of the subsurface hydrocarbon reservoir is established. The model is formed of a plurality of cells. Each of the cells has an equation set associated therewith. The equation set includes one or more equations that represent a reservoir property in the respective cell. At block 154 the number and frequency of timesteps is set. The timesteps may be measured by any unit of time, such as seconds, months, years, centuries, and so forth. At block 156 solutions to the equation sets are discovered according to according to aspects and methodologies disclosed herein. For example the disclosed flexible and adaptive method may be performed iteratively at each timestep as described herein. Based on the output of block 156, at block 158 a reservoir simulation is generated, and at block 159 the simulation results are outputted, such as by displaying the simulation results.

[0085] Figure 15 illustrates an exemplary system within a computing environment for implementing the system of the present disclosure and which includes a computing device in the form of a computing system 210, which may be a UNIX-based workstation or commercially available from Intel, IBM, AMD, Motorola, Cyrix and others. Components of the computing system 210 may include, but are not limited to, a processing unit 214, a system memory 216, and a system bus 246 that couples various system components including the system memory to the processing unit 214. The system bus 246 may be any of several types of bus structures including a memory bus or memory controller, a peripheral bus, and a local bus using any of a variety of bus architectures.

[0086] Computing system 210 typically includes a variety of computer readable media. Computer readable media may be any available media that may be accessed by the computing system 210 and includes both volatile and nonvolatile media, and removable and non-removable media. By way of example, and not limitation, computer readable media may comprise computer storage media and communication media. Computer storage media includes volatile and nonvolatile, removable and non removable media implemented in any method or technology for storage of information such as computer readable instructions, data structures, program modules or other data.

[0087] Computer memory includes, but is not limited to, RAM, ROM, EEPROM, flash memory or other memory technology, CD-ROM, digital versatile disks (DVD) or other optical disk storage, magnetic cassettes, magnetic tape, magnetic disk storage or other magnetic storage devices, or any other medium which may be used to store the desired information and which may be accessed by the computing system 210.

[0088] The system memory 216 includes computer storage media in the form of volatile and/or nonvolatile memory such as read only memory (ROM) 220 and random access memory (RAM) 222. A basic input/output system 224 (BIOS), containing the basic routines that help to transfer information between elements within computing system 210, such as during start-up, is typically stored in ROM 220. RAM 222 typically contains data and/or program modules that are immediately accessible to and/or presently being operated on by processing unit 214. By way of example, and not limitation, Figure 15 illustrates operating system 226, application programs 228, other program modules 230 and program data 232.

[0089] Computing system 210 may also include other removable/non-removable, volatile/nonvolatile computer storage media. By way of example only, Figure 15 illustrates a hard disk drive 234 that reads from or writes to non-removable, nonvolatile magnetic media, a magnetic disk drive 236 that reads from or writes to a removable, nonvolatile magnetic disk 238, and an optical disk drive 240 that reads from or writes to a removable, nonvolatile optical disk 242 such as a CD ROM or other optical media. Other removable/non-removable, volatile/nonvolatile computer storage media that may be used in the exemplary operating environment include, but are not limited to, magnetic tape cassettes, flash memory cards, digital versatile disks, digital video tape, solid state RAM, solid state ROM, and the like. The hard disk drive 234 is typically connected to the system bus 246 through a non-removable memory interface such as interface 244, and magnetic disk drive 236 and optical disk drive 240 are typically connected to the system bus 246 by a removable memory interface, such as interface 248.

[0090] The drives and their associated computer storage media, discussed above and illustrated in Figure 15, provide storage of computer readable instructions, data structures, program modules and other data for the computing system 210. In Figure 15, for example, hard disk drive 234 is illustrated as storing operating system 278, application programs 280, other program modules 282 and program data 284. These components may either be the same as or different from operating system 226, application programs 230, other program modules 230, and program data 232. Operating system 278, application programs 280, other program modules 282, and program data 284 are given different numbers hereto illustrates that, at a minimum, they are different copies.

[0091] A user may enter commands and information into the computing system 210 through input devices such as a tablet, or electronic digitizer, 250, a microphone 252, a keyboard 254, and pointing device 256, commonly referred to as a mouse, trackball, or touch pad. These and other input devices often may be connected to the processing unit 214 through a user input interface 258 that is coupled to the system bus 218, but may be connected by other interface and bus structures, such as a parallel port, game port or a universal serial bus (USB). [0092] A monitor 260 or other type of display device may be also connected to the system bus 218 via an interface, such as a video interface 262. The monitor 260 may be integrated with a touch-screen panel or the like. The monitor and/or touch screen panel may be physically coupled to a housing in which the computing system 210 is incorporated, such as in a tablet-type personal computer. In addition, computers such as the computing system 210 may also include other peripheral output devices such as speakers 264 and printer 266, which may be connected through an output peripheral interface 268 or the like.

[0093] Computing system 210 may operate in a networked environment using logical connections to one or more remote computers, such as a remote computing system 270. The remote computing system 270 may be a personal computer, a server, a router, a network PC, a peer device or other common network node, and typically includes many or all of the elements described above relative to the computing system 210, although only a memory storage device 272 has been illustrated in Figure 15. The logical connections depicted in Figure 15 include a local area network (LAN) 274 connecting through network interface 286 and a wide area network (WAN) 276 connecting via modem 288, but may also include other networks. Such networking environments are commonplace in offices, enterprise-wide computer networks, intranets and the Internet. For example, computer system 210 may comprise the source machine from which data is being migrated, and the remote computing system 270 may comprise the destination machine. Note however that source and destination machines need not be connected by a network or any other means, but instead, data may be migrated via any machine-readable media capable of being written by the source platform and read by the destination platform or platforms.

[0094] The central processor operating system or systems may reside at a central location or distributed locations (i.e., mirrored or stand-alone). Software programs or modules instruct the operating systems to perform tasks such as, but not limited to, facilitating client requests, system maintenance, security, data storage, data backup, data mining, document/report generation and algorithms. The provided functionality may be embodied directly in hardware, in a software module executed by a processor or in any combination of the two.

[0095] Furthermore, software operations may be executed, in part or wholly, by one or more servers or a client's system, via hardware, software module or any combination of the two. A software module (program or executable) may reside in RAM memory, flash memory, ROM memory, EPROM memory, EEPROM memory, registers, hard disk, a removable disk, a CD-ROM, DVD, optical disk or any other form of storage medium known in the art. For example, a storage medium may be coupled to the processor such that the processor may read information from, and write information to, the storage medium. In the alternative, the storage medium may be integral to the processor. The processor and the storage medium may also reside in an application- specific integrated circuit (ASIC). The bus may be an optical or conventional bus operating pursuant to various protocols that are well known in the art. One system that may be used is a Linux workstation configuration with a Linux 64-bit or 32-bit Red Hat Linux WS3 operating system, and an NVIDIA Quadro graphics card. However, the system may operate on a wide variety of hardware.

[0096] Figure 16 shows a representation of machine-readable code 300 that may be used with a computing system such as computing system 210. At block 302 code is provided for determining a stability limit for each of a plurality of cells in a reservoir model that approximates a subsurface hydrocarbon reservoir. Each cell has associated therewith an equation set representing a reservoir property. At block 304 code is provided for assigning each cell to an explicit formulation or an implicit formulation. At block 306 code is provided for providing an initial guess to a solution for a system of equations formed using the equation set for each cell in the plurality of cells. At block 308 code is provided for using the initial guess to solve for a solution to the system of equations using an explicit formulation for cells assigned thereto and an implicit formulation for cells assigned thereto. At block 310 code is provided for establishing a list of unconverged cells. The unconverged cells have equation sets that have not satisfied a convergence criterion. At block 312 code is provided for calculating a stability limit for each of the converged cells. The converged cells have equation sets that have satisfied the convergence criterion. At block 314 code is provided for constructing a reduced nonlinear system with the list of unconverged cells when the number of unconverged cells is greater than a predetermined amount. The reduced nonlinear system is assigned to be solved with the implicit formulation, and other cells are assigned to be solved with the explicit formulation. At block 316 code is provided for repeating the using, establishing, calculating, and constructing parts of the code, substituting the solved solution for the initial guess or the most recent solved solution and substituting the equation sets corresponding to the cells in the list of unconverged cells for the system of equations or equation sets from the most recent iteration, until all equation sets satisfy the convergence criterion and a stability criterion. At block 318 code is provide for outputting the solved solution as a result for a timestep of a simulation of the subsurface reservoir when all equation sets satisfy the convergence criterion and the stability criterion. Code effectuating or executing other features of the disclosed aspects and methodologies may be provided as well. This additional code is represented in Figure 16 as block 320, and may be placed at any location within code 300 according to computer code programming techniques.

[0097] Aspects disclosed herein may be used to perform hydrocarbon management activities such as extracting hydrocarbons from a subsurface region or reservoir, which is indicated by reference number 332 in Figure 17. A method 340 of extracting hydrocarbons from subsurface reservoir 332 is shown in Figure 18. At block 342 inputs are received from a numerical model, geologic model, or flow simulation of the subsurface region, where the model or simulation has been run or improved using the methods and aspects disclosed herein. At block 344 the presence and/or location of hydrocarbons in the subsurface region is predicted. At block 346 hydrocarbon extraction is conducted to remove hydrocarbons from the subsurface region, which may be accomplished by drilling a well 334 using oil drilling equipment 336 (Figure 17). Other hydrocarbon management activities may be performed according to known principles.

[0098] The disclosed aspects, methodologies and techniques may be susceptible to various modifications, and alternative forms and have been shown only by way of example. The disclosed aspects, methodologies and techniques are not intended to be limited to the specifics of what is disclosed herein, but include all alternatives, modifications, and equivalents falling within the spirit and scope of the appended claims.