Numerical assessment of the mechanical stability in vertical, directional and horizontal wellbores

In this research the stability of wellbore is evaluated in seven different stress regimes and diverse orientations using FLAC3D software. The normalized yielded zone area (NYZA, i.e., the ratio of surrounding yielded cross-sectional area to initial area of wellbore) is determined for different mud pressures as well as diverse orientations of wellbore. By means of MATLAB software the best curve is fitted to the recorded points and then the optimized mud pressure is calculated using these plots. The optimized orientation is selected considering these data. Finally the mud pressure resulted from this method was compared with the mud pressure obtained from the Mogi-Coulomb criterion and then with the fields data. The minimum allowable mud pressure obtained from the NYZA criterion is close to actual data and the value obtained from the Mogi-Coulomb criterion. Hence, the NYZA is considered to be an appropriate criterion for wellbore stability analysis.