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Congress passes many laws – that is its principal function as outlined in Article I of the U.S. Constitution. It also controls the nation’s purse strings, deciding how tax revenue collected from the people will be spent for the people.
Time after time: Advanced geophysical techniques have been used for identifying fractures in Saudi Arabia. The rest of the story, however, was getting the story …
From west to east, with increasing geological complexity, the Utica and Lorraine Shale Gas Fairway comprises three distinct plays.
Northern exposure: That gush of excitement you may feel may be coming from Canada – specifically, eastern Canada – and it’s all because the Utica shale play there may be as big as the Barnett.
The year of living dangerously: Grim days, challenging conditions, exciting discoveries. A look back at the top global developments of 2009.
The Eagle and the hawk: A still-fledging shale gas play, the Cretaceous Eagle Ford, is making a lot of noise in Texas – and the hawks are circling to get a piece of the action.
Shortly after lunch on Oct. 14 people began filing into the ballroom of the Tulsa Marriott Southern Hills Hotel. They included attendees of the 2009 AAPG Mid-Continent Section meeting, members of the general public and two busloads of students from local high schools. They were there to participate in a conversation about energy – its past and its future.
A recent AAPG Geosciences Technology Workshop examined the contributions, challenges and responsibilities of geoscientists in estimating resources and reserves.
How big is big? A team of U.S. Geological Survey geologists is doing a new assessment of – and taking a “long” look at – the unconventional potential of the Arkoma Basin.
This month’s column deals with determining reservoir heterogeneity in Athabasca oil sands from surface seismic data.
Production from unconventional petroleum reservoirs includes petroleum from shale, coal, tight-sand and oil-sand. These reservoirs contain enormous quantities of oil and natural gas but pose a technology challenge to both geoscientists and engineers to produce economically on a commercial scale. These reservoirs store large volumes and are widely distributed at different stratigraphic levels and basin types, offering long-term potential for energy supply. Most of these reservoirs are low permeability and porosity that need enhancement with hydraulic fracture stimulation to maximize fluid drainage. Production from these reservoirs is increasing with continued advancement in geological characterization techniques and technology for well drilling, logging, and completion with drainage enhancement. Currently, Australia, Argentina, Canada, Egypt, USA, and Venezuela are producing natural gas from low permeability reservoirs: tight-sand, shale, and coal (CBM). Canada, Russia, USA, and Venezuela are producing heavy oil from oilsand. USA is leading the development of techniques for exploring, and technology for exploiting unconventional gas resources, which can help to develop potential gas-bearing shales of Thailand. The main focus is on source-reservoir-seal shale petroleum plays. In these tight rocks petroleum resides in the micro-pores as well as adsorbed on and in the organics. Shale has very low matrix permeability (nano-darcies) and has highly layered formations with differences in vertical and horizontal properties, vertically non-homogeneous and horizontally anisotropic with complicate natural fractures. Understanding the rocks is critical in selecting fluid drainage enhancement mechanisms; rock properties such as where shale is clay or silica rich, clay types and maturation , kerogen type and maturation, permeability, porosity, and saturation. Most of these plays require horizontal development with large numbers of wells that require an understanding of formation structure, setting and reservoir character and its lateral extension. The quality of shale-gas resources depend on thickness of net pay (>100 m), adequate porosity (>2%), high reservoir pressure (ideally overpressure), high thermal maturity (>1.5% Ro), high organic richness (>2% TOC), low in clay (<50%), high in brittle minerals (quartz, carbonates, feldspars), and favourable in-situ stress. During the past decade, unconventional shale and tight-sand gas plays have become an important supply of natural gas in the US, and now in shale oil as well. As a consequence, interest to assess and explore these plays is rapidly spreading worldwide. The high production potential of shale petroleum resources has contributed to a comparably favourable outlook for increased future petroleum supplies globally. Application of 2D and 3D seismic for defining reservoirs and micro seismic for monitoring fracturing, measuring rock properties downhole (borehole imaging) and in laboratory (mineralogy, porosity, permeability), horizontal drilling (downhole GPS), and hydraulic fracture stimulation (cross-linked gel, slick-water, nitrogen or nitrogen foam) is key in improving production from these huge resources with low productivity factors.
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