Quantitative analysis of meso-damage evolution for shale under in situ uniaxial compression conditions

In order to investigate the meso-damage evolution of shale, four uniaxial compressive tests were conducted using X-ray micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) equipment. Two of the four samples were conducted the in situ compression tests, from which a series of CT images at different stress levels were got during the loading process. Based on those CT images, a new damage variable was first proposed to quantitatively analyze the damage evolution of shale under uniaxial compression condition. Analysis results show that the evolution of the damage variable is consistent with both the mesoscopic CT images and the macroscopic stress–strain, which can well characterize the meso-damage evolution of shale. Additionally, the parameters of crack area and crack length were obtained to quantitatively describe the cracking characteristics. The statistical results demonstrate that the distributions of crack are closely related to the scanning stress levels and the scanning elevations. These quantitative conclusions are important to understand the meso-damage evolution and the cracking mechanism of shale.