UNCONVENTIONAL EXPLOITATION OF OIL/GAS: A STUDY ON FRACTURED SHALE

UNDER THE GUIDANCE OF: DR.K.C.MATHUR

It has taken between 50300 million to form, and yet we have managed to burn roughly half of all global oil reserves in merely 125 years or so. The world now consumes 80-82 million barrels of oil per day, or 40,000 gallons per second, and demand is growing exponentially

By 2030 ,the oil production will start decreasing

A petroleum reservoir, or oil and gas reservoir, is a subsurface pool of hydrocarbons contained in porous or fractured rock formations. The naturally occurring hydrocarbons, such as crude oil or natural gas, are trapped by overlying rock formations with lower permeability.

The unconventional resources usually refer to ultra low permeability reservoirs that cannot be produced at economic rates or volumes without stimulation of near well-bore regions. New technologies of horizontal well coupled with staged hydraulic fracturing have made the development of these reservoirs an economic reality . Moreover presence of natural fractures that are possibly connected through the horizontal wells and the hydraulic fractures and makes the subject matter for the present study

Better reservoir knowledge increasingly sophisticated technologies ,make the production of unconventional resources economically viable and more efficient.

This efficiency is bringing shale reservoirs tight gas and oil coalbed methane ,into the reach of more companies around the world.

Shale is a fine-grained sedimentary rock that forms from the compaction of silt and claysize mineral particles that we commonly call "mud". This composition places shale in a category of sedimentary rocks known as "mudstones". Shale is distinguished from other mudstones because it is fissile and laminated. "Laminated" means that the rock is made up of many thin layers. "Fissile" means that the rock readily splits into thin pieces along the laminations. Black organic shales are the source rock for many of the world's most important oil and natural gas deposits.

Shale Gas:
Natural gas is found in shale. Shale gas is considered an

unconventional source of natural gas, in that the methods used to extract it are not the same as conventional gas recovery.

Shale gas, with estimated global, technically recoverable reserves of 6600 trillion cubic feet has the potential to make several countries, including the U.S., energy independent. In fact, shale gas, once unrecoverable, now accounts for over 30% of U.S. natural gas production.
The Barnett Shale of Texas was the first major natural gas field developed in a shale reservoir rock. Producing gas from the Barnett Shale was a challenge. The pore spaces in shale are so tiny that the gas has difficulty moving through the shale & into the well.

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There is much confusion about the terms shale oil and oil shale. The two are often used interchangeably, but, in fact are very different.

Oil shale is an organic-rich sedimentary rock that contains kerogen. Kerogen-rich rock must be heated at extremely high temperatures (500 degrees Celsius) in order to process it into liquid oil. Shale oil on the other hand, is oil produced directly from shale reservoirs. Shale oil does not have to be heated in order to flow into a well.

 Shale

oil, with estimated global reserves of 2.9 trillion barrels, holds huge promise as an emerging energy supply. But the technical challenges posed by shale play composition, location and extraction methods require: a great deal of innovation robust global energy prices in order to make production financially feasible.

1. Drilling Horizontal wells & targeting the Sweet Spot Challenge

Positioning the horizontal wellbore in the target zone for optimal production

The multistage hydraulic fracturing stimulates the reservoir effectively with an engineered solution. Implementation of massive multi-stage hydraulic fracturing (MMHF) in long horizontal wells has changed the natural gas industry worldwide

Indrora Pay Shale reservoirs are so called unconventional fractured shale reservoirs due to their low permeability characteristics.
Indrora Pay Shale reservoir is characterized by high pressure to the order of 3060% more than hydrostatic (232kg/cm2 at 1460m in Ind-1 during 1971, 169.7kg/cm2 at 1460m in 1991)) as is evident from continuous gas and oil shows while drilling through this section and recorded pressures in drilled wells. However, the formation pressure has declined from original more than 60% than hydrostatic to present 20-30% more than hydrostatic based on the recently drilled well data on Ind-11.

High pressure in these shales is caused diagenetically by conversion of clay minerals like montmorillonite into illite, which release water and exert over pressure.

Paleozoic Devonian and Mississippi shales of USA, especially Barnett Shales of Fort Worth Basin, North Central Texas are most active gas plays at present.
However, Brown Shales and Antelope shales of san Joaquin valley are oil producing analogs to Indrora shales. Overall, USA shale reservoirs are dominantly gas producer while Indrora shale reservoirs are dominant oil producers

PREPARED BY: DIVYA SHARMA R040208012 PRASHANT TIWARI R040208026