scholarly journals In situ stress and pore pressure in the Kumano Forearc Basin, offshore SW Honshu from downhole measurements during riser drilling

2013 ◽  
Vol 14 (5) ◽  
pp. 1454-1470 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. M. Saffer ◽  
P. B. Flemings ◽  
D. Boutt ◽  
M.-L. Doan ◽  
T. Ito ◽  
...  
1982 ◽  
Vol 22 (03) ◽  
pp. 333-340 ◽  
Author(s):  
Norman R. Warpinski ◽  
James A. Clark ◽  
Richard A. Schmidt ◽  
Clarence W. Huddle

Abstract Laboratory experiments have been conducted to determine the effect of in-situ stress variations on hydraulic fracture containment. Fractures were initiated in layered rock samples with prescribed stress variations, and fracture growth characteristics were determined as a function of stress levels. Stress contrasts of 300 to 400 psi (2 to 3 MPa) were found sufficient to restrict fracture growth in laboratory samples of Nevada tuff and Tennessee and Nugget sandstones. The required stress level was found not to depend on mechanical rock properties. However, permeability and the resultant pore pressure effects were important. Tests conducted at biomaterial interfaces between Nugget and Tennessee sandstones show that the resultant stresses set up near the interface because of the applied overburden stress affect the fracture behavior in the same way as the applied confining stresses. These results provide a guideline for determining the in-situ stress contrast necessary to contain a fracture in a field treatment. Introduction An under-standing of the factors that influence and control hydraulic fracture containment is important for the successful use of hydraulic fracturing technology in the enhanced production of natural gas from tight reservoirs. Optimally, this understanding would provide improved fracture design criteria to maximize fracture surface area in contact with the reservoir with respect to volume injected and other treatment parameters. In formations with a positive containment condition (i.e., where fracturing out of zone is not anticipated), long penetrating fractures could be used effectively to develop the resource. For the opposite case, the options would beto use a small treatment so that large volumes are not wasted in out-of-zone fracturing and to accept a lower productivity improvement, orto reject the zone as uneconomical. These decisions cannot be made satisfactorily unless criteria for vertical fracture propagation are developed and techniques for readily measuring the important parameters are available. Currently, both theoretical and experimental efforts are being pursued to determine the important parameters and their relative effects on fracture growth. Two modes of fracture containment are possible. One is the situation where fracture growth is terminated at a discrete interface. Examples of this include laboratory experiments showing fracture termination at weak or unbonded interfaces and theoretical models that predict that fracture growth will terminate at a material property interface. The other mode may occur when the fracture propagates into the bounding layer, but extensive growth does not take place and the fracture thus is restricted. An example is the propagation of the fracture into a region with an adverse stress gradient so that continued propagation results in higher stresses on the fracture, which limits growth, as suggested by Simonson et al. and as seen in mineback experiments. Another example is the possible restriction caused by propagation into a higher modulus region where the decreased width results in increased pressure drop in the fracture, which might inhibit extensive growth into that region relative to the lower modulus region. Other parameters, such as natural fractures, treatment parameters, pore pressure, etc., may affect either of these modes. Laboratory and mineback experiments have shown that weak interfaces and in-situ stress differences are the most likely factors to contain the fracture, and weak interfaces are probably effective only at shallow depths. Thus, our experiments are being performed to determine the effect of in-situ stresses on fracture containment, both in a uniform rock sample and at material properly interfaces. SPEJ P. 333^


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Takuma Kaneshima ◽  
Fuqiao Bai ◽  
Nobuo Morita

Abstract Borehole stability depends on various parameters such as rock strength, rock deformations, in-situ stress, borehole trajectory, shale swelling, pore pressure change due to osmosis, overbalance mud weight and temperature. The objective of this work is to construct analytical and numerical equations to predict borehole failure including all these parameters, and to comprehensively propose a methodology to improve the borehole stability. Analytical solutions are developed for inclined wells with respect to in-situ stress, shale swelling, pore pressure change due to osmosis, overbalance mud weight and temperature. A numerical model is developed for 3D inclined wells with orthotropic formation and layered formation. Using the analytical and the numerical models, stress state around inclined wells are evaluated. The breakout angle is predicted based on Mohr-Coulomb, Mogi, Lade and Drucker-Prager failure theories. Polar diagrams of mud weights are compared to judge the effect of each parameter and the magnitude predicted by the different failure theories. Shale swelling and pore pressure change due to osmosis are the most difficult to estimate among above-mentioned parameters. The laboratory measured swelling of cores obtained from various formations showed that the magnitude to induce breakouts caused by swelling was the largest comparing with other parameters. Therefore, when shale stability problems occur, we need to estimate the magnitude of shale swelling and osmosis due to water potential difference. Then, to overcome the shale stability problem, we evaluated the sensitivity of human controllable parameters on borehole stability. The parameters which can be controlled by drilling engineers are overbalance, type of mud, borehole temperature and borehole trajectory. If the shale swelling is small, the borehole stability is improved by the mud weight. However, from the swelling tests from the cores of Nankai-Trough, we estimated unless we used a swelling inhibitor to reduce the swelling less than 0.1%, the well was not possible to drill through. Actually, the well was abandoned due to instability after trying side track several times. Unlike previous works, this paper uses all important parameters (swelling, temperature, pore pressure, orthotropic formation, layered formation) to estimate the stresses around inclined wells with the same formation conditions for quantitative analysis. Failure analysis include Mohr, Mogi, Lade and Drucker-Prager. Finally, the polar diagrams of critical mud weight are used to judge whether we can choose well trajectory, orientation with respect to bedding planes, mud weight, shale inhibitor, and temperature to stabilize the borehole.


SPE Journal ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 23 (04) ◽  
pp. 1019-1038 ◽  
Author(s):  
Feifei Zhang ◽  
Yongfeng Kang ◽  
Zhaoyang Wang ◽  
Stefan Miska ◽  
Mengjiao Yu ◽  
...  

Summary This paper identifies wellbore-stability concerns caused by transient swab/surge pressures during deepwater-drilling tripping and reaming operations. Wellbore-stability analysis that couples transient swab/surge wellbore-pressure oscillations and in-situ-stress field oscillations in the near-wellbore (NWB) zone in deepwater drilling is presented. A transient swab/surge model is developed by considering drillstring components, wellbore structure, formation elasticity, pipe elasticity, fluid compressibility, fluid rheology, and the flow between wellbore and formation. Real-time pressure oscillations during tripping/reaming are obtained. On the basis of geomechanical principles, in-situ stress around the wellbore is calculated by coupling transient wellbore pressure with swab/surge pressure, pore pressure, and original formation-stress status to perform wellbore-stability analysis. By applying the breakout failure and wellbore-fracture failure in the analysis, a work flow is proposed to obtain the safe-operating window for tripping and reaming processes. On the basis of this study, it is determined that the safe drilling-operation window for wellbore stability consists of more than just fluid density. The oscillation magnitude of transient wellbore pressure can be larger than the frictional pressure loss during the normal-circulation process. With the effect of swab/surge pressure, the safe-operating window can become narrower than expected. The induced pore pressure decreases monotonically as the radial distance increases, and it is limited only to the NWB region and dissipates within one to two hole diameters away from the wellbore. This study provides insight into the integration of wellbore-stability analysis and transient swab/surge-pressure analysis, which is discussed rarely in the literature. It indicates that tripping-induced transient-stress and pore-pressure changes can place important impacts on the effective-stress clouds for the NWB region, which affect the wellbore-stability status significantly.


Author(s):  
Eva Lopez-Puiggene ◽  
Nubia Aurora Gonzalez-Molano ◽  
Jose Alvarellos-Iglesias ◽  
Jose M. Segura ◽  
M. R. Lakshmikantha

Solids/sand production is an unintended byproduct of the hydrocarbon production that, from an operational point of view, might potentially lead to undesirable consequences. This paper focuses on a study centered in the geomechanical perspective for solids production. An integrated workflow is presented to analyze the combined effect of reservoir pore-pressure, drawdown, in-situ stress, rock properties and well/perforations orientation on the onset of solid production. This workflow incorporates analyses at multiple scales: rock constitutive modeling at lab scale, 1D geomechanical models at wellbore scale along well trajectories, a 3D geomechanical model at the reservoir scale and 3D/4D high resolution reservoir - geomechanical coupled models at the well and perforation scale. 1D geomechanical models were built using log and field data, drilling experience and laboratory tests in order to characterize in situ stresses, pore pressure and rock mechanics properties (stiffness and strength) profiles for several wells. Rock shear failure mechanism was also analyzed in order to build a pre-drill model and evaluate the wellbore stability from a geomechanical point of view. Pre-production stress modeling was simulated to obtain a representative initial stress state integrating 1D geomechanics well results, 3D dynamic model and seismic interpretations. Mechanical properties were distributed considering properties calculated in the 1D geomechanical models as input. 3D stress field was validated with in-situ stress profiles from 1D modeling results. This simulated pre-production stress state was then used as an initial condition for the reservoir - geomechanical coupled simulations. Effective stress changes and deformations associated to pore pressure changes were calculated including the coupling between reservoir and geomechanical modeling. Finally, a 3D/4D high resolution well scale reservoir - geomechanical coupled numerical model was built in order to determine the threshold of sand production. A limit of plastic strain was obtained based on numerical simulations of available production data, DST and ATWC tests. This critical plastic strain limit was used as a criterion (strain-based) for rock failure to define the onset of sand production as a function of pore pressure, perforation orientation and rock strength. Conclusions regarding the perforation orientations related to the possibility of producing solids can support operational decisions in order to avoid undesirable solid production and therefore optimize the production facilities capacity and design to handle large amounts of solids and/or the clogging of the well.


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