Shale gas From Conventional reservoirs to Unconventional

Reservoirs
In conventional reservoirs volumes of gas and oil are produced at economic
flow rates without applying stimulation treatment such as acidizing, solvent
injection, thermal methods and so on. These reservoirs have high to medium
permeabilities with vertical wells. In contrast unconventional reservoirs do
not produce enough oil and gas to have economic production flow rate
without massive hydraulic stimulation treatments or special recovery
processes. Unconventional reservoirs can be in different forms such as tight
gas, coal-bed methane, and shale.Fig 1 shows different unconventional
sources. Development of the unconventional reservoirs is based on higher
prices and higher risks than development of the conventional reservoirs.

Figure 1 Conventional resources, unconventional (coal bed methane, tight gas sand, gas
shale-rich) natural gas sources.(EIA)

Shale gas is one of the unconventional sources of natural gas. This gas is
present in the sedimentary loamy rocks, also called shale. In near future,
shale gas can ease the demand pressure for conventional natural gas price
peak. Shale gas is becoming an important source of energy as a natural gas,
but shale gas reservoirs have a very complicated nature, these reservoirs are
known by their naturally fractured nature and very weak permeability in their
matrix network.
In shale gas reservoirs, the usual vertical well drilling is not convenient for
gas production .in order to make these type of reservoirs economically

beneficial, development of the shale gas was stimulated by the large-scale

use of technology of hydraulic fracturing; in which injection of water at very
high pressure and cracking of the shale is done to create extensive artificial
fractures around well bores and increase the rock permeability. In latest
developments, this technology is combined with technology of horizontal
drilling in which the lateral lengths can reach up to 3 km. The rate of possible
recovery is in the order of 20-40 %.
1.1 Schematic Geology of Natural Gas Resources
Total organic content TOC is a key property of shale, when considering gas
potential, also thermal maturity. TOC is the total amount of organic material
(kerogen) present in the rock, expressed as a percentage by weight.
Generally higher TOC means the better the potential for hydrocarbon
generation. The thermal maturity of the rock is a measure of the degree to
which organic matter contained in the rock has been heated over time, and
potentially converted into liquid and/or gaseous hydrocarbons. Thermal
maturity is measured using vitrinite reflectance (Ro).
Shale gas can be found in sedimentary layers rich in organic matter, which
has mainly clay mineralogy, with quartz and carbonates that make them
brittle and gives them the appearance of the shale. Shale layer can be both
the source rock and reservoir rock. Gas in shale gas reservooirs is found in
form of free gas and also adsorbed gas. In general,in shale gas reservoirs
there is little associated water, amount of water in reservoir can be
dramatically increased with artificial fracturing,in which artificially created
fractures which are made by high water injection can increase water content
in reservoir, also fractures can make connection between groundwater and
the reservoir.
Another feature of shale gas compared to most conventional reservoirs like
sandstone, limestone or, gas shale have extremely low permeability. Also
effective bulk permeability in gas shale is typically much less than 0.1 (md),
although exceptions exist where the rock is naturally fractured; for example,
the well-fractured Antrim shale in the Michigan Basin in the U.S.
1.2

Gas compositionof shaleandgeneral properties of shale

Shale gas is a fine grained sedimentary rock formed by the compaction of

silt, clay or sand that accumulates in deltas and on lake and ocean
bottoms.Themotherrockgasis natural gascomposed mainly ofcarbon and
hydrogen. It iscomposed primarily of methane, ethane, nitrous, carbon

dioxide, hydrogen sulfideand propane.Although the proportionsof shale

gasand compositionvary from onereservoir to another one, typical valuesare
shown in thetable 1.1(Modern ShaleGasDevelopment in theUnited States: A
Primer, 2009).
Methane
95%

Ethane, propane
and butane
4%

carbon dioxide,
hydrogen sulfide
1%

nitrous oxygen
and rare gases
Very limited

Table 1 Typical gas composition for shale gas

Some general properties of shale are given as following:

Most of the sediment particles consists of mud-size particles

(<0.06mm).Rocks formed from this sediment fall under the generic
term shale.
Shalecontains clay minerals, fine-size quartz and feldspars, plus
organic material, but the classification shale still rests on particle size
rather than mineralogy.
Shales form under any environmental setting that supplies abundant
fines to calm water. Most form in marine environments adjacent to a
continent, where the seafloor lies below storm wave base.