Fundamentals of Reservoir Rock Properties

FUNDAMENTALS OF
RESERVOIR ROCK
PROPERTIES

Written By
Tarek A. Ganat
Tarek Al-Arbi Omar Ganat

Fundamentals of Reservoir
Rock Properties

123
Tarek Al-Arbi Omar Ganat
Department of Petroleum Engineering
Universiti Teknologi Petronas
Seri Iskender, Malaysia

ISBN 978-3-030-28139-7 ISBN 978-3-030-28140-3 (eBook)

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Introduction

In general, naturally occurring rocks are saturated with fluids, water, oil, or gas
(Amyx et al. 1960). Any formation rock can produce oil, gas, and water which are
considered as reservoir rock. A reservoir rock is a rock has an adequate perme-
ability and porosity to permit fluids flow, to accumulate and to extract in viable
volumes (Daniel and Lapedes 1978).
Normally, hydrocarbons exist in sandstones, carbonate, and shales formations
and also are present in metamorphic and igneous rocks (basement rock). The
principal reservoir rocks are sandstone and carbonate formations. Typically, the
physical properties and the composition of the sandstone and carbonate reservoir
rocks are varying (Cecil 1949). Therefore, known the physical properties of
reservoir rocks, reservoir engineers can estimate the hydrocarbon reserve and
identified the ultimate reservoir recovery and determine the best effective produc-
tion that is economically viable under the existing condition.
The scale of investigation used in reservoir studies is microscopic (geological
thin section), macroscopic (wireline log, core plug), megascopic (reservoir mod-
elling grid cell), and gigascopic (well test). In this section, the focus will be on
microscopic and megascopic scales to characterise the reservoir. By studying a core
sample of any reservoir rock under telescopic equipments, to determine the reser-
voir rock and the reservoir textures either solid or brittle. The reservoir pore space is
generally known as voidage space (pores media), where the fluids can either move
in and fill in the apertures or pass throughout the void space if the pores are
connected. From the shape and size of the connected apertures in a reservoir, the
estimation of the ability of the reservoir rock to store and transfer the fluids can be
evaluated. Hence, the reservoir rock physical properties are very reliant on the
composition and the rock texture.
The following are the main important characteristics of oil reservoir properties
that control the overall reservoir performance and production potential:

v
vi Introduction

1. The reservoir rock porosity, permeability, and compressibility;

2. The capillary pressure, phase saturation, relative permeability, wettability
properties;
3. The net to gross of reservoir hydrocarbons and fluid mixture composition.
The objective of this book is to understand the fundamentals and the definitions
of the petrophysical properties and their laboratory measurements. The main pur-
pose of reservoir description is to make 3D images’ petrophysical properties of the
reservoir rocks.

Reservoir Rocks

The reservoir rock is permeable rock formation capable of retaining the hydro-
carbon reserves. It consists of one or more subsurface lithological units of either
sedimentary or carbonate origin. Reservoir rocks are described by good perme-
ability and porosity and confined by sealed layers that trap the hydrocarbons.
A reservoir cross section is depicted in Fig. 1. Hydrocarbon is produced from
underground permeable rock formations throughout production wells optimally
drilled around the reservoir area.
Usually, reservoir rocks contain pores media and the fraction of pores in the total
rock volume is known as effective porosity. The pores need to be interconnecting
and permit the hydrocarbons to flow everywhere. The lack of impediment in the
reservoir enhances the permeability which is the ability of the fluid to transfer
within the pore space of the reservoir rock.
The geological trap is rocks that confine hydrocarbons in the subsurface. Above
the trap, there is an impermeable rock layer that prevents the hydrocarbons from
migrating to the shallower layers or to the surface. Below the reservoir rock, there is
a plane surface that splits it from the underlying fluid, usually briny water.
A reservoir rock may contain liquid, gas, or both, and the vertical occurrence of

Fig. 1 Cross-sectional view of a simple reservoir oil and gas accumulation in an anticline trap
Introduction vii

fluids in the structure is governed by the gravitational separation. If the three phases
exist in the reservoir rock, then the reservoir fluids are stacked on the top of each
other, due to the difference in densities, gas on top, oil in the middle, and water on
the bottom.

References

Amyx J, Bass D, Whiting RL (1960) Petroleum reservoir engineering physical properties.

ISBN:9780070016002, 0070016003
Cecil GL (1949) Principles of petroleum geology. In: The century earth science series. Appleton-
Century-Crofts, Inc., New York
Lapedes DN (1978) McGraw-Hill encyclopedia of the geological sciences. McGraw-Hill
Contents

1 Physical Properties of Reservoir Rocks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

1.1 Routine Core Analysis (RCA) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
1.2 Special Tests Core Analysis (SCAL) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.3 Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) Core Analysis . . . . . . . . . . 4
2 Porosity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
2.1 Types of Geologic Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
2.2 Porosity of Packing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
2.3 Particle Shape . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.4 Factors Affecting Porosity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.5 The Range of Porosity Values in Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2.6 Measurement of Porosity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
3 Permeability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
3.1 Methodology to Measure Permeability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
3.2 Measurement of Permeability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
3.3 Absolute Permeability Correlations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
3.4 Vertical and Horizontal Permeability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
3.5 Factors Affecting the Permeability Value . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
3.6 PoroPerm Relationships . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
3.7 Microbialite Poro-Perm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
3.8 Estimating Permeability Based on Kozeny-Carman Equation . . . . 39
3.9 Directional Permeability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
3.10 Lorenz Coefficient . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
3.11 Dykstra-Parsons Coefficient . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
4 Wettability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
4.1 Surface Tension and Contact Angle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
4.2 Hysteresis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

ix
x Contents

4.3 Wettability Alteration Using Nanoparticles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

4.4 Imbibition and Drainage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
4.5 Measuring Wettability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
4.6 Comparison of the Amott and USBM Wettability Methods . . . . . 65
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
5 Saturation and Capillary Pressure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
5.1 Saturation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
5.2 Determination of Fluid Saturation from Rock Sample . . . . . . . . . 70
5.3 Reservoir Saturation with Depth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
5.4 Capillary Pressure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
5.5 Laboratory Methods of Measuring Capillary Pressure . . . . . . . . . 77
5.6 Capillary Hysteresis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
5.7 Averaging Capillary Pressure Data: Leverett J-Function . . . . . . . 81
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
6 Relative Permeability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
6.1 Corey Relations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
6.2 Estimating Aperture Size Distribution Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
6.3 Laboratory Measurements of Relative Permeability . . . . . . . . . . . 93
6.4 Steady State Method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
6.5 Unsteady-State Method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
6.6 The Relationship Between Relative Permeability, Capillary
Pressure, and Fractional Flow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .... 96
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
7 Overburden Pressure and Compressibility of Reservoir Rock . . . . . 105
7.1 Overburden Pressure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . 105
7.1.1 Pore Pressure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . 107
7.1.2 Effective Pressure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . 107
7.2 Compressibility of Reservoir Rock . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . 108
7.2.1 Effects of Rock Compressibility on Field
Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
8 Unconventional Petroleum Reservoirs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
8.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
8.2 Unconventional Petroleum Geology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
8.3 Types of Continuous Petroleum Accumulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
8.4 Methods and Technologies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
8.5 Defining Unconventional Oil and Gas Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
8.6 Nanopore System Reservoirs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
8.7 Formation Evaluation and Reservoir Characterization
of Unconventional Reservoirs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Contents xi

8.8 Determination of Kerogen Contained Fluid Saturations . . . . . . . . 126

8.9 Factors Affecting Unconventional Oil and Gas Recovery . . . . . . 127
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
9 Naturally Fractured Reservoirs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
9.1 Rock Mechanics Versus Fracturing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
9.2 Deformational Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
9.3 Quantitative Assessment of Fracturing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
9.4 Indicators of Natural Fractures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
9.5 Area of Fractures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144
9.6 Fluid Saturation in a Fractured Reservoir . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
9.7 Relationship of Permeability Versus Porosity in a Fracture
Network System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
9.8 Compressibility in a Fractured Rock . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
9.9 Relative Permeability in a Fractured Reservoir . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
9.10 Capillary Pressure Curve in Fracture Formation . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
9.11 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155