Reservoir Geomechanics

About

This interdisciplinary book encompasses the fields of rock mechanics, structural geology and petroleum engineering to address a wide range of geomechanical problems that arise during the exploitation of oil and gas reservoirs. It considers key practical issues such as prediction of pore pressure, estimation of hydrocarbon column heights and fault seal potential, determination of optimally stable well trajectories, casing set points and mud weights, changes in reservoir performance during depletion, and production-induced faulting and subsidence. The book establishes the basic principles involved before introducing practical measurement and experimental techniques to improve recovery and reduce exploitation costs. It illustrates their successful application through case studies taken from oil and gas fields around the world. This book is a practical reference for geoscientists and engineers in the petroleum and geothermal industries, and for research scientists interested in stress measurements and their application to problems of faulting and fluid flow in the crust.

Content

Part 1: Basic Principles
3-26The tectonic stress field
27-55Pore pressure at depth in sedimentary basins
56-83Basic constitutive laws
84-139Rock failure in compression, tension and shear
140-164Faults and fractures at depth
Part 2: Measuring Stress Orientation and Magnitude
167-205Compressive and tensile failures in vertical wells
206-234Determination of S3 from mini-fracs and extended leak-off tests and constraining the magnitude of SHmax from wellbore failures in vertical wells
235-265Wellbore failure and stress determination in deviated wells
266-298Stress fields – from tectonic plates to reservoirs around the world
Part 3: Applications
301-339Wellbore stability
340-377Critically stressed faults and fluid flow
378-422Effects of reservoir depletion