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Abstract
China is believed to own the worlds largest shale gas reserve and is the third country to exploit shale gas
breakthrough in the world. Fuling gas play in Sichuan basin is one typical shale gas reservoir in China
gaining good production performance, and the absolute open flow capacity (AOF) of some wells reaches
as high as 1.5 million cubic meters per day. However, we still havent get good understanding of AOF
to evaluate the producing potential and performance of hydraulic fracturing in Fuling shale gas play.
In order to quantify the influence of parameters on AOF, statistical analyses are conducted on fourteen
parameters including formation porosity, total organic carbon (TOC), injected fluid volume, injected
proppant volume, injected fluid volume per stage, injected proppant volume per stage, proppant concentration, fractured stages, and fractured clusters, horizontal lateral length, angle between horizontal lateral
and minimum stress direction, cumulative production in the first three months, stimulated reservoir
volume (SRV) and flowback recovery in the first three months.
Results show that six parameters including cumulative gas in first three months, angle between
horizontal lateral and minimum stress direction, SRV, TOC, porosity and injected fluid volume show
relative strong correlation with AOF with coefficient bigger than 0.50. The influence of the other nine
parameters on AOF is very weak, and the coefficient between AOF and water flowback recovery in early
days is even as small as 0.11.
AOF is negatively correlated to three parameters including proppant volume per stage, proppant
concentration, and angle between horizontal lateral and minimum stress direction. The negative influence
of proppant concentration on AOF may have been caused by ineffective fractures (networks), and a
positive correlation can be expected if proppants are injected into sweet points that meet the geology and
engineering requirements and improved stimulation techniques with better performance of fracture
propagation control. The angle between horizontal lateral and minimum stress direction is suggested to be
less than 20 in order to get bigger AOF. AOF is positively correlated to the other eleven parameters. High
TOC, porosity, injected fluid volume are good indication of high AOF.
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Introduction
On the basis of released data of technically recoverable shale gas sources from the U.S Energy
Information Administration (EIA) or the Ministry of Land and Resources of China, China owns the
worlds largest shale gas reserves (Ministry of Land and Resources of China, 2010; EIA, 2013; Wang
Zhigang, 2014, 2015), 25 1012m3, which are 10 times more than Chinas current proven conventional
gas reserves.
Chinas shale gas resources are widely spreaded in Sichuan, Tarim, Junggar, Jianghan, Songliao and
other basins (Fig.1). Currently, Chinas shale gas exploration and development are mainly focused on
three marine shales formations in and around Sichuan basin including the Silurian Longmaxi, the
Cambrian age Qiongzhusi, and Niutitang.
Fuling shale gas reservoir is Chinas first commercially industrial developed shale gas play. It is located
in Sichuan basin. The major productive formations are Lower Silurian Longmaxi and Ordovician Wufeng.
Its buried over 2,500 meters and target formation thickness is 89 meters, among which, high-graded shale
gas play takes 38 meters (Lu Baoping, 2013; Zeng Yijin, 2014). The average porosity is about 4%. The
formation temperature is about 85 C and formation pressure varies from 36 to 40 MPa. By the end of
2014, 136 wells have been drilled and 75 wells have been put on production. Nearly all the wells are
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horizontal wells with multiple transverse fractures (MTFW). The horizontal lateral lengths are from 1000
to 2000 meters. About 60% of the wells are fractured 16 to 20 stages (Fig.3), with 30 to 40 103 m3 of
injected fluid (Fig.4) and 500 to 1100 m3 of injected proppants (Fig.5). The pilot area of Fuling shale gas
play has about 20 wells and it will be the target area for this paper.
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As we couldnt get satisfying correlation between AOF and fluid volume and proppant volume, we
wonder whether relationships can be better if we divide the fluid volume and proppant volume by
fractured stages, as shown in Fig.11 and Fig.12. However, the relationships get worse with correlation
coefficients of 0.34 and 0.28, and the injected proppant volume per stage even presents negative
correlation with AOF.
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Fig.13 shows the relationship between AOF and proppant concentration. Unexpectedly, AOF shows
negative correlation with proppant concentration. If we put Fig.10, Fig.12 and Fig.13 together, we can
infer that some proppants may not have played their role in creating fractures (networks). Or, the fractures
(networks) were indeed created, but some dont contribute to gas flow, so they are ineffective fractures.
Therefore, the AOF may be positively correlated to proppant concentration if all proppants are injected
into sweet points that meet the geology and engineering requirements. Also, the stimulation technique
may still have room for improvement to make effective fractures (networks).
Fig.14 and Fig.15 show the relationships of AOF vs. fractured stages and AOF vs. fractured clusters.
AOF is positively correlated with stages and clusters. The clusters have slightly relative stronger influence
on AOF (with coefficient of 0.49) than that of stages (with coefficient of 0.45).
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Fig.17 is the relationship between AOF and angle between horizontal lateral and minimum stress
direction. AOF is negatively related to the angle with a relative high correlation coefficient of 0.63. The
angle is suggested to be less than 20 in order to get bigger AOF.
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Figure 17Relationship between AOF and Angle between Horizontal Lateral and Minimum Stress Direction
Fig. 18 illustrates the relationship between AOF and cumulative gas production in the first three
months. AOF is positively correlated to the cumulative production. Compared with that of other
parameters, the cumulative gas production shows relatively stronger influence on AOF with the correlation coefficient of 0.75. Therefore, we can expect high cumulative production once we get high AOF.
Figure 18 Relationship between AOF and Cumulative Production in First Three Months
Fig.19 demonstrates the relationship between AOF and SRV. The SRV is estimated from production
rate and pressure transient analysis. The SRV presents positive correlation with AOF with coefficient of
0.63. Thus, although AOF may only reflect the gas flow capacity in fractures or near fractures zone for
shale gas wells because the testing duration is usually not long enough, we may still have a quick
qualitative estimation of SRV from AOF.
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Fig.20 shows the relationship between AOF and water flowback recovery in the first three months.
Because the coefficient is as small as 0.0045, we could say that the flowback recovery in early production
days has little effect on AOF.
Figure 20 Relationship between AOF and Water Flowback Recovery in First Three Months
All the correlation coefficients of the correlation equations of AOF and 14 parameters are tabulated in
Table 1.
Correlation coefficient
Parameters
Correlation coefficient
Porosity
TOC
Injected fluid volume
Injected proppant volume
Injected fluid volume per stage
Injected proppant volume per stage
Proppant concentration
0.61
0.62
0.56
0.30
0.34
0.28
0.38
Fractured stages
Fractured clusters
Horizontal lateral length
Angle between horizontal lateral and minimum stress direction
Cumulative gas in first three months
SRV
Flowback recovery in first three months
0.45
0.49
0.47
0.63
0.75
0.63
0.0045
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Conclusions
In order to quantify the influence of parameters on AOF of the pilot wells in Fuling shale gas play,
statistical analyses are conducted on three kinds of parameters including formation, stimulation, and well
parameters.
Acknowledgement
Financial support from SINOPEC project (No. P14056 and P13088) is gratefully acknowledged. The
authors would like to thank Sinopec Research Institute of Petroleum Engineering (SRIPE) for the
permission to publish this paper.
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