International Journal of Coal Geology 103 (2012) 12

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International Journal of Coal Geology

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijcoalgeo

Preface

Shale gas and shale oil petrology and petrophysics

Shale gas and shale oil1 reservoir rocks are petroleum source rocks that have retained a proportion of the hydrocarbons generated during their diagenesis. These rocks with suitable drilling, completion and development strategies may yield hydrocarbons at commercial rates and quantities. The modern era of shale gas production began with the success of the Barnett shale in the United States in the 1980s when it was demonstrated that shale wells were capable of producing at rates in excess of a million standard cubic feet per day (30000 m3/day). Although gas has been produced from shales in North America since at least 1821, the rates were too low to be more than of local signicance. With the condence gained that silica-rich, ne-grained rocks, such as the Barnett shale, could yield economic production rates, particularly with horizontal drilling and fracing technologies in the early 2000s, the industry looked to analogous rocks such as the Fayetteville ( 2004) and Woodford ( 2005) shales in the United States and the Muskwa ( 2007) shale in Canada. Carbonate and more clay-rich, ne-grained rocks were initially considered less exploitable due to presumed greater ductility and hence difculty in fracing, but with the development of the clay-rich Haynesville (2006) and carbonate-rich Marcellus ( 2004), Eagle Ford ( 2008) and Muskwa shales of the Cordova Embayment, this was shown to be incorrect. Similarly, industry initially targeted rocks that were over-mature with respect to the oil window, due to the view that the presence of liquids and/or condensation of liquids in the reservoir would result in poor productivity. Although the reservoir mechanics of liquid and gas producing shales remains poorly understood, there has been great success in liquid production in the Eagleford, Utica and other shales. Currently, liquid hydrocarbon producing shales are the principal targets, particularly in North America, due to weak gas prices. Today, almost every organic bearing, ne-grained rock in North America has been studied by the industry and particularly those strata that lie in the oil window. It appears that the gas revolution started by shale exploitation may well be mirrored by a parallel oil revolution. Outside of North America, shales are now being actively explored, although at the time of this publication there is little if any commercial production. The reason for the slow or lack of development of shale reservoirs outside of North America is multifaceted; but is related to political and perceived environmental risk of development, lack of petroleum infrastructure and poor understanding of the geology. In as much as shale gas and shale oil reservoirs are source rocks with retained

1 The term oil shale has long been used in the scientic and engineering literature in reference to kerogen-rich rocks, which yield signicant liquid hydrocarbons on pyrolysis (i.e., the Green River oil shale). The term oil shale is now also being used in reference to shales that contain retained liquids, which may or may not be produced (a parallel term to gas shale). To avoid confusion I use and recommend the use of shale oil to refer to negrained rocks that have retained liquids.

hydrocarbons, it follows that wherever there is conventional hydrocarbon production there must be source rocks and if there are source rocks there is at least the potential for shale gas and/or shale oil development. The absence of conventional economic hydrocarbon accumulations does not necessarily rule out the presence of source rocks with retained hydrocarbons for example in South Africa's Karoo Basin and Australia's Precambrian basins. Estimates of global shale gas resources are largely based on the current understanding of the distribution of source rocks. Rogner (1997) estimated global resources at 470 TCM (16000 TCF) and more recently the EIA (2011) has suggested a number of 700 TCM (25000 TCF). Regardless if these resource estimates are accurate, there is wide acceptance that the resources of gas and oil in ne-grained rocks is enormous and the exploitation of hydrocarbons from these rocks represents a paradigm shift in energy with far reaching implications for global economics and politics. A diverse set of ne-grained rocks are referred to shale gas and/or shale oil reservoirs including porcellanite, siltstone, limestone, dolomite, mudstone and rarely true shale. The word shale is thus clearly not used by students of shale gas and shale oil in the sense intended by the early stratigraphers and sedimentologists, but the new broader use of the word is so now universally used it needs to be accepted with this broader meaning. Although there has been some formal and many informal attempts to classify these rocks, no proposed classication system has been accepted. There are few common attributes amongst successfully exploited shale gas/oil reservoirs. However, one attribute all productive rocks share is the presence of a signicant amount of organic carbon of appropriate thermal maturity. The organic carbon provides the source of the generated hydrocarbons and partial storage of hydrocarbons by sorption and, at least in some rocks, storage in pores in the organic matter created by shrinkage of the organic matter during diagenesis. With the role of organic carbon paramount to shale gas and shale oil reservoirs, it is tting that the International Journal of Coal Geology, as the preeminent journal for dissemination of research on organic matter in rocks, should undertake a dedicated edition on shale gas and shale oil. If we have learned anything from the short history of modern shale gas (and oil) exploitation is that these rocks are very complex. The difculty of visualising the fabric and mineralogy of ne-grained rocks in hand specimens leads us to the belief that the rocks are comparatively homogenous. The general controls on hydrocarbons in place in ne-grained rocks are fairly well understood, but in detail the controls on porosity and matrix permeability development remain poorly documented and controversial. The papers in this special volume contribute to our knowledge of these important rocks and in particular explore their complexity at the scale of their variability and hence provide new insight to the correlation between petrophysical properties and petrology.

0166-5162/$ see front matter 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.coal.2012.09.003

Preface

The eleven papers in this special volume reect the diverse approaches applied to the study of gas- and oil-bearing, ne-grained rocks. The importance of the creation and nature of pore space in the organic fraction generated during thermal maturation has become topical in the last several years. This theme is well represented in the volume in papers by Bernard et al. (Barnett shale), Laver et al. (Posidonia shale), Curtis et al. (Woodford shale) and Fishman et al. (Kimmeridge shale). Exquisite photographs obtained from eld emission scanning electron microscopy of surfaces prepared by ion milling provide insight into the pore structure of the organic fraction, as well as intergranular and intraparticle porosity. The role of maturity and maceral type on development of the pore space in the organics remains elusive with not all studies in agreement likely reecting the heterogeneity of the organic fraction and the difculty in characterising reservoir scale heterogeneity at the scale of an electron microscope. Akkutlu's paper is a theoretical consideration of the special properties of ow in ultra ne capillaries and it is argued that apparent permeability is higher than that predicted using Klinkenberg slip theory as normally applied. The paper by Mastalerz et al. described the utility of density fractionation of the macerals in an attempt to characterise the variable chemistry of the organic fraction of some New Albany shales using techniques that have been applied to coals. Stepping up a scale, are contributions on the Conasauaga shale by Pashin et al., Mississippian and Lower Pennsylvanian shales of Germany by Uffmann et al. and the Woodford shale by Cardott. Of the three studies, only the Woodford shale is currently

producing commercial hydrocarbons. All three studies demonstrate the complex interplay of factors that contribute to the generative and reservoir characteristics of these complex rocks. The paper by Chalmers et al. describes the petrology of the Horn River Basin shales and demonstrates the relationship between permeability and stress-sensitivity of permeability to mineralogy and fabric of these diverse rocks. The last paper in the volume by Bustin and Bustin shows the interplay between fracture fabric, matrix permeability and rock moduli on production rates of gas shales using sensitivity analyses with base case data from important producing Canadian gas shales. References
EIA, 2011. World shale gas resources: an initial assessment of 14 regions outside the USA. US Energy Information Administration. Department of Energy, Washington DC . http://www.eia.gov/analysis/studies/worldshalegas/pdf/fullreport.pdf. Rogner, H.-H., 1997. An assessment of world hydrocarbon resources. Annual Review of Energy and the Environment 22, 217aE262aE.

R. Marc Bustin University of British Columbia, Dept. of Earth & Ocean Sciences, 6339 Stores Road, British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada BC V6T 1Z4 E-mail address: bustin@mail.ubc.ca.