Application of Lightning Breakdown Simulation in Inversion of Induced Fracture Network Morphology in Stimulated Reservoirs

Accurately characterizing fracture network morphology is necessary for flow simulation and fracturing evaluation. The complex natural fractures and reservoir heterogeneity in unconventional reservoirs make the induced fracture network resulting from hydraulic fracturing more difficult to describe. Existing fracture propagation simulation and fracture network inversion methods cannot accurately match actual fracture network morphology. Considering the lightning breakdown similar as fracture propagation, a new efficient approach for inversion of fracture network morphology is proposed. Based on the dielectric breakdown model (DBM) for lightning breakdown simulation and similarity principle, an induced fracture propagation algorithm integrating reservoir in-situ stress, rock mechanical parameters, and stress shadow effect is proposed. The fractal index and random function are coupled to quantitatively characterize the probability distribution of induced fracture propagation path. At the same time, a matching rate function is proposed to quantitatively evaluate the fitting between fracture network morphology and the micro seismic data. Combined with automatic history matching method, the actual fracture network morphology can be inverted with the matching rate as objective function. The proposed approach is applied to fracture network simulation of mult-fractured horizontal wells of shale oil reservoir in China, and the fracture networks from inversion fit well with the micro seismic data. A simulation of 94 fractures in the 32 section of Well X2 shows that the well propagates more obvious branch fractures. The single-wing fracture network communicates approximately 200m horizontally and approximately 10m vertically. In single fracture flow simulation, it is necessary to consider the influence of complex fracture network morphology, but when simulating fluid flow for a single well or even a reservoir, only the main fracture needs to be considered. This paper proposes an induced fracture propagation algorithm that integrates reservoir in-situ stress, rock mechanical parameters, and stress shadowing effects. This algorithm greatly improves the calculation efficiency on the premise of ensuring the accuracy of induced fracture network morphology. The approach in this paper provides a theoretical basis for flow simulation of stimulated reservoirs and optimization of fracture networks.

Effect of Multiple Fracture Initiation on the Accuracy of Hydraulic Fracturing Simulation

Hydraulic fracturing is a stimulation technique in which the formation is fractured using high pressure exerted by a fluid. The induced fracture increases the permeability of the formation by providing conductive channels to the formation which results in improved fluids productivity. Hydraulic fracturing is a common practice in oil and gas, particularly in the development of unconventional low porosity and low permeability reservoirs. However, as the hydraulic fracturing technique is costly, considerable preparations efforts must be made before executing the fracturing operation including simulating the intended fracture model. A simulation model of a hydraulic fracturing assists in forecasting and controlling the intended fractures that are to be induced. Although the simulation model can be helpful, it may not exactly mimic or predict the actual initiated fractures due to the complex nature of the actual fracturing process. Thus, the simulated model and the actual fracture might differ in many ways which results in an uncertainty in the simulated fracture model. Therefore, in order to reduce uncertainty, initial data input and assumptions made before and during the fracturing simulation need to be precise in order to obtain accurate simulation results. The growth of a single fracture is often assumed during the simulation of hydraulic fracturing which maybe incorrect as multiple fractures may initiate at the start or middle of the actual fracturing treatment and can have significant effect on the simulated fracturing results. This paper proposes a method to minimize the difference between fracturing simulation and actual fracture treatment results by utilizing sensitivity tests to the main fracturing parameters. Thus, the initial actual fracturing results were used to detect the occurrence of multiple fractures where the latter was considered to enhance the upcoming simulation accuracy of the proposed treatments. The analysis of high net pressure data during the actual treatment indicates the possible presence of multiple fractures where history matching between actual treatment and simulation results data can give an estimate on when and how many multiple fractures were initiated during the fracturing treatment. As a result, the data analysis showed that multiple fractures initiation had a significant effect on the fracture simulation results and the assumption of a single fracture during hydraulic fracturing should be discarded unless it is confirmed to be the case. Geological settings of the reservoir and the presence of natural fractures were also found to cause multiple fractures initiation during the treatments, and therefore, the reservoir data and description need to be determined properly before attempting the simulation of a fracturing treatment.

Engineering Properties Of Ceramsite Proppant And Its Application On Hydraulic Fracture For A Coalbed Methane Well

Ceramsite is a porous engineering material with some basic mineral constituents, and has advantages of low density, high sphericity and high flow conductivity. It should be a good attempt to be adopted in hydraulic fracture, but related researches are really weak. In this paper, laboratory experiments are conducted on ceramsite, coated ceramsite and other typical proppants, which indicates that the coated ceramsite is the best proppant. Then, a coalbed methane well located in the soft coal area in Qinshui basin of China is selected as the research object, numerical simulations and statistic analyses are both conducted to obtain the granularity proportion and parameter optimization by using coated ceramsite. Some findings are achieved. Numerical simulation indicates that the granularity proportion for coated ceramsites of 40/60, 16/40 and 12/20 mesh should choose 1:6:2, which can receive a biggest proppant concentration and strongest flow conductivity. Construction parameters are all optimized for a best fracture performance. Micro seismic monitoring indicates that the actual fracture performance matches well with the simulated result. Drainage performance comparisons reveal that coated ceramsite is suitable for soft coal areas, and can achieve good drainage performances.

A methodology of re-generating a representative element volume of fractured rock mass

In simulation of fractured rock mass such as mechanical calculation, hydraulic calculation or coupled hydro-mechanical calculation, the representative element volume of fractured rock mass in the simulating code is very important and give the success of simulation works. The difficulties of how to make a representative element volume are come from the numerous fractures distributed in different orientation, length, location of the actual fracture network. Based on study of fracture characteristics of some fractured sites in the world, the paper presented some main items concerning to the fracture properties. A methodology of re-generating a representative element volume of fractured rock mass by DEAL.II code was presented in this paper. Finally, some applications were introduced to highlight the performance as well as efficiency of this methodology.

Experimental Study of the Effect of High Temperature on the Mechanical Properties of Coarse Sandstone

In order to study the effect of high temperature on the mechanical properties of rock, two groups of coarse sandstone samples were subjected to the uniaxial compression and triaxial compression test at room temperature of 25 °C and high temperatures of 100~1000 °C. The study comes to some conclusions: (1) With the increase of temperature, the longitudinal wave velocity gradually decreases, and the damage factor of temperature gradually increases. (2) For uniaxial compression tests at different temperatures, the high temperature action within 500 °C has a strengthening effect on the compression strength, and the high temperature effect has a weakening effect on the compression strength when temperatures exceed 500 °C; so 500 °C is the temperature threshold. (3) For triaxial compression tests at different temperatures, the rock strength is positively correlated with temperature and confining pressure when the temperature is lower than 800 °C and the confining pressure is lower than 15 MPa; the rock strength is negatively correlated with temperature and confining pressure when the temperature is over 800 °C and confining pressure is above 15 MPa, so 800 °C is the temperature threshold, and 15 MPa is the confining pressure threshold. (4) In the triaxial compression, the actual fracture angle of the sample after high temperature is basically the same as the theoretical calculation value, high temperature has little effect on the actual fracture angle of the sample, and the actual fracture angle is negatively correlated with the confining pressure.

Analysis of Vibration Plate Cracking Based on Working Stress

At present, vibroseis has become the major technique to achieve environmental protection and high efficiency in fossil fuel exploration. During such exploration, a vibrator transmits seismic waves to the surface. The waves are excited by continuously changing the load stress from the burden of weight of the vehicle and the vibrator’s variable frequency load. This paper will apply a numerical simulation method to develop research on the analysis of vibration plate cracking based on working stress. Based on the structure and mechanism of vibroseis vibrator plate, a vibrator simulation model is built under system dynamics to develop research on the vibroseis plate load stress feature and gain distribution, and change pattern of the plate load stress. The results show that stress response around the upright welding of is high, and there is evident distortion in plate area, which matches the actual fracture position on the plate, and can be confirmed as a key area of plate fatigue.

Failure Assessment of the Gas Pipeline by Considering the Geometric Constraint Effect

Due to the extensive applications of large diameter/thickness and higher pressure gas transmission pipelines, and there will be an increasing need for reliable pipeline design and failure assessment that will preclude catastrophic accident. Specifically, the actual fracture toughness needs to be determined accurately. The present work innovatively correlate the material’s fracture toughness with the crack-tip geometric constraint effect by using the crack-tip plastic zone. The significant “thickness effect” impact on pipeline steel’s fracture toughness is elucidated by the proposed out-of-plane constraint factor 1αout. The critical loads (FCi) of three groups of thin thickness specimens at fracture are recorded by the three-point bending tests performed on the single-edge notched (SENB) specimens, corresponding fracture toughness are calculated according to the ASTM E1921-97 procedure. Moreover, finite element simulation of the SENB specimens, coupled with the applications of cohesive zone model (CZM), virtual crack closure technique (VCCT), the X70 pipeline steel’s critical energy release rate (ERR) is achieved and applied to predict the FCi of arbitrary specimen thickness while crack initiates, corresponding fracture toughness KCi are obtained and compared with the experimental ones. The present research will be beneficial for the prediction of pipeline steel’s actual fracture toughness and the retrenchment of experimental costs.

The mechanism of earthquake

The physical mechanism of earthquake remains a challenging issue to be clarified. Seismologists used to attribute shallow earthquake to the elastic rebound of crustal rocks. The seismic energy calculated following the elastic rebound theory and with the data of experimental results upon rocks, however, shows a large discrepancy with measurement — a fact that has been dubbed as “the heat flow paradox”. For the intermediate-focus and deep-focus earthquakes, both occurring in the region of the mantle, there is not reasonable explanation either. This paper will discuss the physical mechanism of earthquake from a new perspective, starting from the fact that both the crust and the mantle are discrete collective system of matters with slow dynamics, as well as from the basic principles of physics, especially some new concepts of condensed matter physics emerged in the recent years. (1) Stress distribution in earth’s crust: Without taking the tectonic force into account, according to the rheological principle of “everything flows”, the normal stress and transverse stress must be balanced due to the effect of gravitational pressure over a long period of time, thus no differential stress in the original crustal rocks is to be expected. The tectonic force is successively transferred and accumulated via stick-slip motions of rock blocks to squeeze the fault gouge and then exerted upon other rock blocks. The superposition of such additional lateral tectonic force and the original stress gives rise to the real-time stress in crustal rocks. The mechanical characteristics of fault gouge are different from rocks as it consists of granular matters. The elastic moduli of the fault gouges are much less than those of rocks, and they become larger with increasing pressure. This peculiarity of the fault gouge leads to a tectonic force increasing with depth in a nonlinear fashion. The distribution and variation of the tectonic stress in the crust are specified. (2) The strength of crust rocks: The gravitational pressure can initiate the elasticity–plasticity transition in crust rocks. By calculating the depth dependence of elasticity–plasticity transition and according to the actual situation analysis, the behaviors of crust rocks can be categorized in three typical zones: elastic, partially plastic and fully plastic. As the proportion of plastic portion reaches about 10% in the partially plastic zone, plastic interconnection may occur and the variation of shear strength in rocks is mainly characterized by plastic behavior. The equivalent coefficient of friction for the plastic slip is smaller by an order of magnitude, or even less than that for brittle fracture, thus the shear strength of rocks by plastic sliding is much less than that by brittle breaking. Moreover, with increasing depth a number of other factors can further reduce the shear yield strength of rocks. On the other hand, since earthquake is a large-scale damage, the rock breaking must occur along the weakest path. Therefore, the actual fracture strength of rocks in a shallow earthquake is assuredly lower than the average shear strength of rocks as generally observed. The typical distributions of the average strength and actual fracture strength in crustal rocks varying with depth are schematically illustrated. (3) The conditions for earthquake occurrence and mechanisms of earthquake: An earthquake will lead to volume expansion, and volume expansion must break through the obstacle. The condition for an earthquake to occur is as follows: the tectonic force exceeds the sum of the fracture strength of rock, the friction force of fault boundary and the resistance from obstacles. Therefore, the shallow earthquake is characterized by plastic sliding of rocks that break through the obstacles. Accordingly, four possible patterns for shallow earthquakes are put forward. Deep-focus earthquakes are believed to result from a wide-range rock flow that breaks the jam. Both shallow earthquakes and deep-focus earthquakes are the energy release caused by the slip or flow of rocks following a jamming–unjamming transition. (4) The energetics and impending precursors of earthquake: The energy of earthquake is the kinetic energy released from the jamming–unjamming transition. Calculation shows that the kinetic energy of seismic rock sliding is comparable with the total work demanded for rocks’ shear failure and overcoming of frictional resistance. There will be no heat flow paradox. Meanwhile, some valuable seismic precursors are likely to be identified by observing the accumulation of additional tectonic forces, local geological changes, as well as the effect of rock state changes, etc.