An Application of an Artificial Intelligence Program for Bailing Operation Management in West Virginia

ABSTRACT The success of a bailing operation depends solely on management in order to keep the operation economical. A novel approach to solve this managment challenge is to use an artificial intelligence program. A prototype bailing evaluation package has been completed with decline curve analysis, artificial intelligence program, and data base. A decline curve analysis program can be applied to fit the bailing cycles of each well in order to predict the future bailing schedule and bailing gain. The bailing cost and other economic parameters have been used to determine the economic limits for bailing cycle investment, These parameters are being used to set the multiwell priority list for planning one month bailing operations. The line pressure, geographic location, weather conditions, farming activities, and operational problems are optimized into a working list to establish a priority list for the bailing of each well. An artificial intelligence program is being used for selecting and evaluating the priority list of the bailed wells. In addition, a database system is also being compiled to supply pertinent data for the bailing evaluation. This paper presents the way these three programs work together as a bailing evaluation package.