Increasing stimulated reservoir volume SRV in unconventional reservoirs: Microstructural and rock mechanical study

The huge resources of unconventional hydrocarbon reserves across the world coupled with the growing oil value makes their contribution to be significantly important to the world economy. Oil producing companies can invest in unconventional hydrocarbon to cover local demand and save crude oil for exporting. Conversely, one of the foremost challenge that producers face in unconventional reservoirs is the need for large stimulated reservoir volume (SRV) to ensure economical production. This study describes a new stimulation technique to increase the stimulated reservoir volume using the chemical reactions along with hydraulic fracturing fluid. Reactive chemicals are used to generate the localized pressure and heat in tight formations to create additional micro fracturing, thus increase the fracture complexity. Created induced micro-fractures considerably increased the porosity, permeability, and ultimately the SRV. The synthetic sweetspots are created nearby a wellbore and fractured area by the help of new stimulation treatment mechanism. Results showed significant conductivity increase with new treatment technique. Rock samples were studied for mineralogical and microstructural characterizations using advanced spectroscopy and microscopy analytical techniques. Moreover, on each rock specimen ultrasonic compressional (P-wave) and shear (S-wave) velocities were recorded and dynamic Poisson's ratio and Young's modulus were determined. The obtained topographical images revealed the presence of micro-cracks and nanoscale pores in all studied core samples. The novelty of this study is to develop a novel fracturing technique to increase stimulated reservoir volume (SRV). The parameters studied in this research can be served as critical inputs for many field applications such as wellbore stability, casing design and perforation, sand production control, and fracturing.