Model for a Shale Gas Formation with Salt-Sealed Natural Fractures

There are reported cases of hydraulically fractured shale wells that exhibit boundary dominated flow in a very short period. This study suggests that dissolution of salt-sealed natural fractures in the shale offers a novel explanation for the early boundary dominated flow. We first discuss a plausible diagenetic history for generation of a salt-sealed natural fracture system in shale gas and how core, log, and conventional test data may behave. We then note that flowback of water with significantly higher salinity than the injected fracture fluid may suggest that the injected low salinity fracturing fluid dissolved salts that sealed an existing natural fracture system. In this scenario, the effective permeability would represent that of the natural fracture system induced by salt dissolution, and the stimulated rock volume would be directly related to the leakoff volume. A simple material balance model tracks salt dissolution by leaked off fracturing fluid and estimates the resulting stimulated rock volume.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Science

Level thesis:degree_level

Masters

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Petroleum Engineering

Grantor

University of Houston

Year dc:date.issued

2015

Author dc:creator

• Merry, Hoagie

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Ehlig-Economides, Christine

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Myers, Michael T.
• Qin, Guan
• Teets, Thomas S.

• Fracture porosity
• SRV
• DSRV
• Dissolution
• Imbibition
• Salt
• Material balance

Statement dc:rights

• The author of this work is the copyright owner. UH Libraries and the Texas Digital Library have their permission to store and provide access to this work. Further transmission, reproduction, or presentation of this work is prohibited except with permission of the author(s).

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/10657/4844

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:uh-ir.tdl.org:10657/4844