A Review on Shale Reservoirs as an Unconventional Play – The History, Technology Revolution, Importance to Oil and Gas Industry, and the Development Future

As a milestone of the entire energy industry, unconventional resources have inevitably swept the world in the last decade, and will certainly dominate the global oil and gas industry in the near future. Eventually, the “unconventional” will become “conventional”. Along with the rapid development, however, some issues have emerged, which are closely related to the viability of unconventional resources development. Under the current circumstances of low crude oil and gas price, coupled with the prominent environmental concerns, the arguments about the development and production of unconventional resources have been recently heated up. This work introduced the full-blown aspects of unconventional resources especially shale reservoirs, by discussing their concepts and definitions, reviewing the shale gas and shale oil development history and necessity, analyzing the shale plays’ geology and petroleum systems with respects to key hydrocarbon accumulation elements and mechanisms, and summarizing the technology resolution. This study also discussed the relevant key issues, including significant estimation uncertainty of technically recoverable resources, the equivocal understanding of complex geology preventing the production and technologies implementation optimization, the difficulties of experiences and technologies global expanding, and the corresponding risks and uncertainties. In addition, based on the latest production and exploration data, the future perspective of the unconventional resources was depicted from global unconventional resources assessments, technology development, and limitations constraining the development.     

Progress in China's Unconventional Oil & Gas Exploration and Development and Theoretical Technologies

The new century has witnessed a strategic breakthrough in unconventional oil gas.Hydrocarbon accumulated in micro-/nano-scale pore throat shale systems has become an important domain that could replace current oil gas resources.Unconventional oil gas plays an increasingly important role in our energy demand.Tight gas,CBM,heavy oil and asphaltic sand have served as a key domain of exploration development,with tight oil becoming a 'bright spot' domain and shale gas becoming a 'hotspot' domain.China has made great breakthroughs in unconventional oil gas resources,such as tight gas,shale gas,tight oil and CBM,and great progress in oil shale,gas hydrate,heavy oil and oil sand.China has an estimated(223-263)×10~8t of unconventional oil resources and(890-1260)×l0~(12)m~3 of gas resources.China has made a breakthrough for progress in unconventional oil gas study.New progress achieved in fine-grained sedimentary studies related to continental open lacustrine basin large-scale shallow-water delta sand bodies,lacustrine basin central sandy clastic flow sediments and marine-continental fine-grained sediments provide a theoretical basis for the formation and distribution of basin central reservoir bodies.Great breakthroughs have been made in unconventional reservoir geology in respect of research methodology technology,multi-scale data merging and physical simulation of formation conditions.Overall characterization of unconventional reservoirs via multi-method and multi-scale becomes increasingly popular and facilitates the rapid development of unconventional oil gas geological theory,method and technology.The formation of innovative,continuous hydrocarbon accumulation theory,the establishment of the framework of the unconventional oil gas geological theory system,and the determination of the implications,geological feature,formation mechanism,distribution rule and core technology of unconventional oil gas geological study lays a theoretical foundation for extensive unconventional oil gas exploration and development.Theories and technologies of unconventional oil gas exploration and development developed rapidly,including some key evaluation techniques such as 'sweet spot zone' integrated evaluation and a six-property evaluation technique that uses hydrocarbon source,lithology,physical property,brittleness,hydrocarbon potential and stress anisotropy,and some key development engineering technologies including micro-seismic monitoring,horizontal drilling completion and "factory-like" operation pattern, "man-made reservoir" development,which have facilitated the innovative development of unconventional oil gas.These breakthroughs define a new understanding in four aspects:①theoretical innovation;② key technologies;③ complete market mechanism and national policy support;and ④ well-developed ground infrastructure,which are significant for prolonging the life cycle of petroleum industry,accelerating the upgrade and development of theories and technologies and altering the global traditional energy structure.     

Pores Characteristics of Different Types of Shale in China

<正>1 Introduction As the rapid development of the exploration of unconventional oil and gas resources,shale gas resources in China have been becoming the focus of unconventional oil and gas resources research with the characteristics of high resource potential and favorable geological setting.The exploration on the Paleozoic shale gas in southern Sichuan Basin and the Triassic shale gas in northern Sichuan Basin has already achieved important     

Shale Oil Occurrence and Reservoir Characteristics of the Qijia-Gulong Depression in Songliao Basin

<正>1 Introduction The technology breakthrough in the exploration of shale gas and tight oil has greatly extended the global fossil fuel resources(Jia et al.,2012;Zou et al.,2012;Qiu et al.,2013).Although shale oil has been the global hot topic in the study of unconventional resources,there are varied definitions with respect to shale oil by different researchers.     

The Significance of Wettability in Tight Oil Exploration and Development

<正>With the increasing of energy demand and conventional oil and gas resources depletion,unconventional oil and gas resources are getting more and more attention,and have become a major contributor to the global oil and gas production growth over the past five years(Zou et al.,2012;Jia et al.,2014).After shale gas,the tight oil in the     

Shale Gas Formation and Occurrence in China: An Overview of the Current Status and Future Potential

Shale gas is one of the most promising unconventional resources both in China and abroad. It is known as a form of self-contained source-reservoir system with large and continuous dimensions. Through years of considerable exploration efforts, China has identified three large shale gas fields in the Fuling, Changning and Weiyuan areas of the Sichuan Basin, and has announced more than 540 billion m~3 of proven shale gas reserves in marine shale systems. The geological theories for shale gas development have progressed rapidly in China as well. For example, the new depositional patterns have been introduced for deciphering the paleogeography and sedimentary systems of the Wufeng shale and Longmaxi shale in the Sichuan Basin. The shale gas storage mechanism has been widely accepted as differing from conventional natural gas in that it is adsorbed on organic matter or a mineral surface or occurs as free gas trapped in pores and fractures of the shale. Significant advances in the techniques of microstructural characterization have provided new insights on how gas molecules are stored in micro- and nano-scale porous shales. Furthermore, newly-developed concepts and practices in the petroleum industry, such as hydraulic fracturing, microseismic monitoring and multiwell horizontal drilling, have made the production of this unevenly distributed but promising unconventional natural gas a reality. China has 10–36 trillion m~3 of promising shale gas among the world's whole predicted technically recoverable reserves of 206.6 trillion m~3. China is on the way to achieving its goal of an annual yield of 30–50 billion m~3 by launching more trials within shale gas projects.     

A unified model for the formation and distribution of both conventional and unconventional hydrocarbon reservoirs

The discovery and large-scale exploration of unconventional oil/gas resources since 1980s have been considered as the most important advancement in the history of petroleum geology;that has not only changed the balance of supply and demand in the global energy market,but also improved our understanding of the formation mechanisms and distribution characteristics of oil/gas reservoirs.However,what is the difference of conventional and unconventional resources and why they always related to each other in petroliferous basins is not clear.As the differences and correlations between unconventional and conventional resources are complex challenging issues and very critical for resources assessment and hydrocarbon exploration,this paper focused on studying the relationship of formations and distributions among different oil/gas reservoirs.Drilling results of 12,237 exploratory wells in 6 representative petroliferous basins of China and distribution characteristics for 52,926 oil/gas accumulations over the world were applied to clarify the formation conditions and genetic relations of different oil/gas reservoirs in a petroliferous basin,and then to establish a unified model to address the differences and correlations of conventional and unconventional reservoirs.In this model,conventional reservoirs formed in free hydrocarbon dynamic field with high porosity and permeability located above the boundary of hydrocarbon buoyancy-driven accumulation depth limit.Unconventional tight reservoirs formed in confined hydrocarbon dynamic field with low porosity and permeability located between hydrocarbon buoyancy-driven accumulation depth limit and hydrocarbon accumulation depth limit.Shale oil/gas reservoirs formed in the bound hydrocarbon dynamic field with low porosity and ultra-low permeability within the source rock layers.More than 75%of proved reserves around the world are discovered in the free hydrocarbon dynamic field,which is estimated to contain only 10%of originally generated hydrocarbons.Most of undiscovered resources distributed in the confined hydrocarbon dynamic field and the bound hydrocarbon dynamic field,which contains 90%of original generated hydrocarbons,implying a reasonable and promising area for future hydrocarbon explorations.The buried depths of hydrocarbon dynamic fields become shallow with the increase of heat flow,and the remaining oil/gas resources mainly exist in the deep area of“cold basin”with low geothermal gradient.Lithology changing in the hydrocarbon dynamic field causes local anomalies in the oil/gas dynamic mechanism,leading to the local formation of unconventional hydrocarbon reservoirs in the free hydrocarbon dynamic field or the occurrence of oil/gas enrichment sweet points with high porosity and permeability in the confined hydrocarbon dynamic field.The tectonic movements destroy the medium conditions and oil/gas components,which leads to the transformation of conventional oil/gas reservoirs formed in free hydrocarbon dynamic field to unconventional ones or unconventional ones formed in confined and bound hydrocarbon dynamic fields to conventional ones.     

Lower Limits and Grading Evaluation Criteria of Source Rocks and Reservoirs of Tight Oil and Gas

<正>1 Introduction The importance of the unconventional petroleum is increasingly prominent,with the rising demand of oil and gas in the economic and social development and the gradual consumption and depletion of conventional oil and gas resources.Compared with the shale and coal-bed gas reservoir,tight reservoir has better fracturing capability.So     

Economic feasibility and efficiency enhancement approaches for in situ upgrading of low-maturity organic-rich shale from an energy consumption ratio perspective

The technical feasibility of in situ upgrading technology to develop the enormous oil and gas resource potential in low-maturity shale is widely acknowledged. However, because of the large quantities of energy required to heat shale, its economic feasibility is still a matter of debate and has yet to be convincingly demonstrated quantitatively. Based on the energy conservation law, the energy acquisition of oil and gas generation and the energy consumption of organic matter cracking, shale heat-absorption, and surrounding rock heat dissipation during in situ heating were evaluated in this study. The energy consumption ratios for different conditions were determined, and the factors that influence them were analyzed. The results show that the energy consumption ratio increases rapidly with increasing total organic carbon (TOC) content. For oil-prone shales, the TOC content corresponding to an energy consumption ratio of 3 is approximately 4.2%. This indicates that shale with a high TOC content can be expected to reduce the project cost through large-scale operation, making the energy consumption ratio after consideration of the project cost greater than 1. In situ heating and upgrading technology can achieve economic benefits. The main methods for improving the economic feasibility by analyzing factors that influence the energy consumption ratio include the following: (1) exploring technologies that efficiently heat shale but reduce the heat dissipation of surrounding rocks, (2) exploring technologies for efficient transformation of organic matter into oil and gas, i.e., exploring technologies with catalytic effects, or the capability to reduce in situ heating time, and (3) establishing a horizontal well deployment technology that comprehensively considers the energy consumption ratio, time cost, and engineering cost.     

The Influence of Pore Throat Radius on its Internal Oil and Water Wettability

<正>With the rising of energy demand and the dwindling of conventional oil and gas resources,the unconventional oil and gas resources are getting more and more attention,and has become the main contribution of global oil and gas production growth over the past five years.Compared with the North American marine tight oil,China Continental tight oil reservoir with strong heterogeneity and distribution characteristics of poor stability,and has a     

Division of Matrix- and Fracture-Type Shale Oils in the Jiyang Depression and Their Differences

This study discussed the division of matrix- and fracture-type shale oils in the Jiyang Depression, and proposed the concept of fracture development coefficient. The fracture development coefficient is defined as the ratio of fault throw to the distance between a shale oil well and the nearest fault. Based on CO2 content, state of water, oil production and logging response of shale oil formations, the classification of shale oils was established, i.e., a fracture-type shale oil well has a fracture development coefficient greater than 0.2, while a matrix-type one has a fracture development coefficient less than 0.2. Furthermore, the key control factors of matrix- and fracture-type shale oil enrichment were analyzed using typical anatomical and statistical methods. For matrix-type shale oil enrichment, these factors are lithofacies, total organic carbon (TOC), shale porosity and abnormal pressure; for fracture-type shale oil enrichment, they are lithofacies, extent of fracture development, and abnormal pressure. This study also first described the differences between matrix- and fracture-type shale oils. The results provide reference for the exploration of terrestrial faulted basins in eastern China.     

Distribution characteristics,exploration and development,geological theories research progress and exploration directions of shale gas in China

The shale gas resources in China have great potential and the geological resources of shale gas is over 100×10¹²m³,which includes about 20×10¹²m³ of recoverable resources.Organic-rich shales can be divided into three types according to their sedimentary environments,namely marine,marine-continental transitional,and continental shales,which are distributed in 13 stratigraphic systems from the Mesoproterozoic to the Cenozoic.The Sichuan Basin and its surrounding areas have the highest geological resources of shale gas,and the commercial development of shale gas has been achieved in the Upper Ordovician Wufeng Formation-Lower Silurian Longmaxi Formation in these areas,with a shale gas production of up to 20×10⁹m³ in 2020.China has seen rapid shale gas exploration and development over the last five years,successively achieving breakthroughs and important findings in many areas and strata.The details are as follows.(1)Large-scale development of middle-shallow shale gas(burial depth:less than 3500 m)has been realized,with the productivity having rapidly increased;(2)breakthroughs have been constantly made in the development of deep shale gas(burial depth:3500-4500 m),and the ultradeep shale gas(burial depth:greater than 4500 m)is under testing;(3)breakthroughs have been made in the development of normal-pressure shale gas,and the assessment of the shale gas in complex tectonic areas is being accelerated;(4)shale gas has been frequently discovered in new areas and new strata,exhibiting a great prospect.Based on the exploration and development practice,three aspects of consensus have been gradually reached on the research progress in the geological theories of shale gas achieved in China.(1)in terms of deep-water fine-grained sediments,organic-rich shales are the base for the formation of shale gas;(2)in terms of high-quality reservoirs,the development of micro-nano organic matter-hosted pores serves as the core of shale gas accumulation;(3)in terms of preservation conditions,weak structural transformation,a moderate degree of thermal evolution,and a high pressure coefficient are the key to shale gas enrichment.As a type of important low-carbon fossil energy,shale gas will play an increasingly important role in achieving the strategic goals of peak carbon dioxide emissions and carbon neutrality.Based on the in-depth study of shale gas geological conditions and current exploration progress,three important directions for shale gas exploration in China in the next five years are put forward.     

Physical Evolution History and Analysis of Main Control of Tight Sandstone Reservoir: Take Putaohua Reservoir in Gulong Syncline, Songliao Basin for Example

<正>As a conventional oil and gas reserves and production of energy to succeed,unconventional oil and gas resources is now caused great attention of experts and scholars at home and abroad,at the same time they have developed a series of research against definition boundaries of tight sandstone reservoir,genetic mechanism,development     

The Study of The Tight Sandstone Reservoir’s Characteristics and The Fluid Inclusions in Fuyu Oil Layer, Daqing Placanticline

<正>1 Introduction The exploration and development of unconventional oil and gas is gradually becoming the new hot topic,which is promoted by the increasing demand of oil and gas,as well as the decline in conventional oil and gas production(Jia et al.,2012;Zou et al.,2012).The researches of unconventional oil and gas resources started late in China,while the resources are widely distributed,including     

The Formation Mechanism and Developmental Characteristics of Tight Oil

<正>1 Introduction Unconventional oil and gas,a kind of resources of great exploration potential,has a wide application future.Tight oil,an important part of unconventional oil and gas,attracts much more attention.With the continuous improvement of technology exploration and the continuous exploitation of oil and gas,tight oil is widedly concerned in recent years.In order to exploite tight oil effectively,many researchers using different materials and methods to discuss the     

The Status Quo and Outlook of Chinese Coal Geology and Exploration Technologies

Coal is China＇s dominant energy resource. Coal geological exploration is the basis of sustainable development of coal industry. Since the late 1990s, the advances in Chinese coal geology and exploration techniques have been shown in the following aspects. （1） The basic research of coal geology has changed from traditional geological studies to earth system science; （2） Breakthroughs have been achieved in integrated exploration techniques for coal resources; （3） Evaluation of coal and coalbed methane resources provides important basis for macropolicy making for China＇s coal industry and construction of large coal bases; （4） Significant advances have been made in using information technology in coal geological exploration and 3S （GPS, GIS, RS） technology. For the present and a period of time in the future, major tasks of Chinese coal geological technology are as follows： （1） solving resources replacement problem in eastern China and geological problems of deep mining; （2） solving problem of integrated coal exploration of complex regions in energy bases of central China, and resources problems induced by coal exploitation; （3） making efforts to enhance the level of geological research and resources evaluation of coal-accumulation basins in western China; （4） strengthening geological research of clean coal technologies; （5） strengthening geological research of the problems in modern coal mining and safe production; （6） promoting information technology in coal resources and major geological investigations.     

Buoyance-driven hydrocarbon accumulation depth and its implication for unconventional resource prediction

The discovery of unconventional hydrocarbon resources since the late 20 th century changed geologists' understanding of hydrocarbon migration and accumulations and provides a solution to energy shortage.In 2016,unconventional oil production in the USA accounted for 41% of the total oil production;and unconventional natural gas production in China accounted for 35% of total gas production,showing strong growth momentum of unconventional hydrocarbons explorations.Unconventional hydrocarbons generally coexist with conventional petroleum resources;they sometimes distribute in a separate system,not coexisting with a conventional system.Identification and prediction of unconventional resources and their potentials are prominent challenges for geologists.This study analyzed the results of 12,237 drilling wells in six representative petroliferous basins in China and studied the correlations and differences between conventional and unconventional hydrocarbons by comparing their geological features.Migration and accumulation of conventional hydrocarbon are caused dominantly by buoyance.We propose a concept of buoyance-driven hydrocarbon accumulation depth to describe the deepest hydrocarbon accumulation depth driven dominantly by buoyance;beyond this depth the buoyance becomes unimportant for hydrocarbon accumulation.We found that the buoyance-driven hydrocarbon accumulation depth in petroliferous basins controls the different oil/gas reservoirs distribution and resource potentials.Hydrocarbon migration and accumulations above this depth is dominated by buoyancy,forming conventional reservoirs in traps with high porosity and permeability,while hydrocarbon migration and accumulation below this depth is dominated by non-buoyancy forces(mainly refers to capillary force,hydrocarbon volume expansion force,etc.),forming unconventional reservoirs in tight layers.The buoyance-driven hydrocarbon accumulation depths in six basins in China range from 1200 m to 4200 m,which become shallower with increasing geothermal gradient,decreasing particle size of sandstone reservoir layers,or an uplift in the whole petroliferous basin.The predicted unconventional resource potential below the buoyance-driven hydrocarbon accumulation depth in six basins in China is more than 15.71 × 109 t oil equivalent,among them 4.71× 109 t reserves have been proved.Worldwide,94% of 52,926 oil and gas reservoirs in 1186 basins are conventional reservoirs and only 6% of them are unconventional reservoirs.These 94% conventional reservoirs show promising exploration prospects in the deep area below buoyance-driven hydrocarbon accumulation depth.     

Talk about the Difference and Connection between Conventional and Unconventional Oil

<正>As all the nations in the world demand for more and more oil and gas resources and it is decreasing continually,unconventional oil and gas with the large resource potential gradually become the new exploration areas.Unconventional oil has been attached great importance by countries and companies.It’ll become the inevitable trend of industry development that the extension from the     

TSE on Quantitative Characterization of Shale Reservoir

<正>With the development of unconventional oil and gas exploration,the success of North American shale oil and gas exploration and development,domestic oil workers has increased the focus on shale.In the past,shale is only in the sense of being as a source.The actual exploration and research indicate that shale can also reserve and filtrate     

Petroleum Distribution Characteristics of the Americas and the Exploration Prospect Analysis

The world’s present demand for oil and gas is still in a rapid growth period, and traditional oil and gas resources account for more than 60% of the global oil and gas supply. The Americas is the world’s second largest production and consumption center of liquid fuel, and is also the world’s largest natural gas producer. In 2016, the Americas had 85.3 billion tons of proven oil reserves and 18.7 trillion m3 of proven natural gas reserves, which account for 35.4% and 10.0% of world’s total reserves, respectively. It produced 1267.1 Mt of oil and 1125.4 billion m3 of natural gas, which account for 28.9% and 31.7% of the world’s total production, respectively. The crude oil and natural gas reserves are mainly distributed in the U.S., Canada and Venezuela. The U.S. is the earliest and most successful country in shale gas exploration and development, and its shale gas is concentrated in the southern, central and eastern U.S., including the Marcellcus shale, Barnett shale, EagleFord shale, Bakken shale, Fayettevis shale, Haynsvill shale, Woodford shale and Monterey/Santos shale. The potential oil and gas resources in the Americas are mainly concentrated in the anticline and stratigraphic traps in the Middle-Upper Jurassic slope deposition of the North Slope Basin, the Paleozoic Madsion group dolomite and limestone in the Williston Basin, dominant stratigraphic traps and few structural traps in the Western Canada Sedimentary Basin, the Eocene structural-stratigraphic hydrocarbon combination, structural-unconformity traps and structural hydrocarbon combination, and the Upper Miocene stratigraphic-structural hydrocarbon combination in the Maracaibo Basin of Venezuela, the stratigraphic-structural traps and fault horst, tilting faulted blocks and anticlines related to subsalt structure and basement activity in the Campos Basin, the subsalt central low-uplift belt and supra-salt central low-uplift belt in the Santos Basin of Brazil, and the structural-stratigraphic traps in the Neuquen Basin of Argentina. In addition, the breakthrough of seismic subsalt imaging technology makes the subsalt deepwater sea area of eastern Barzil an important oil and gas potential area.