HomeScience Play Types Tight Gas Sands

Tight Gas Sands

Energy Policy Blog

Those of us in the petroleum industry have been tracking the rapid expansion of oil and gas production from shales and in the process we may not have noticed the rapid expansion of renewable energy, especially wind. Read the latest Energy Information Administration (EIA) statistics.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Energy Policy Blog

China plans to significantly increase its natural gas consumption to help cut its appalling air pollution. But natural gas is still a small part of its energy mix. In addition, and to confound environmentalists, a significant part of China’s gas supply comes from Coal-to-Gas technology, which generates large volumes of greenhouse gas and other pollutants, but does allow China to deliver clean-burning gas to locations with severe air pollution.

Show more
American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Learn! Blog

AAPG offers two short courses in conjunction with this year’s Unconventional Resources Technology Conference (URTeC). A wealth of information in a short period of time, theses short courses are an effective and efficient way to learn about the industry.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Emphasis Article

As Colorado goes, so goes the nation when it comes to energy and environmental policy and the court of public opinion.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Energy Policy Blog

Carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) is perhaps commercially viable but not proven at commercial scale, according to 100 clean-energy experts that recently released their recommendations to the White House: 'Powering Forward: Presidential and Executive Agency Actions to Drive Clean Energy in America.'

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Division Column EMD

Every six months, chairs of the Energy Minerals Division committees convene and report on developments in the areas they cover. In this column, we highlight important observations from these recent reports.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Director’s Corner

Global demand for natural gas continues to grow and the search is on to meet that demand in both the eastern and western hemispheres.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
VG Abstract

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.

Show more

Request a visit from Ameed Ghori!

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)

Related Interests

See Also ...