Tight Reservoir Technology IUGF 20 1 2012

1. Introduction  Hydrocarbon Occurrence in Tight Reservoirs of Cambay

Basin  Mechanism of production from Cambay Shale Tight reservoirs 
Evaluation & Development technologies applied in past  New technologies
for Tight Hydrocarbon Reservoir Development applied in Cambay Field,
Cambay Basin  Possible application of such Tight Reservoir Development
technologies in other basins of India
2. Cambay Petroliferous Basin is on mature stage of exploration in view of
over 50 years of development and production history with focus on known
conventional reservoirs  Thrust is required for development of shallow
Babaguru and Tarapur and deeper Cambay Shale and Olpad formations
including Deccan Trap basement in view of recent encouraging discoveries 
Basin offers further scopes for exploration and production from deeper
tighter unconventional reservoirs of Cambay Shale & Olpad formations,
including fractured trap which constitute 2/3 sedimentary thickness  Recent
development of new technologies of formation evaluation, drilling and
stimulation/HF especially in US and Canada has made low productive
unconventional Tight Gas Sands, Shale Gas and CBM as attractive resources
for production.
3. Cambay Shale known for its major hydrocarbon source also acts as reservoir
in Cambay Basin  Occurrence of hydrocarbons in unconventional reservoir
of Cambay Shale is known since the first discovery oil in the basin at
Cambay Field during 1958  Deeper wells like Cambay-40 & 45 drilled
during 1963 & 1964 encountered oil & gas while drilling under high heat
flow and over pressure conditions  Thereafter, oil & gas production was
obtained from so called “fractured shale reservoir” of Cambay Shale in
fields like Kalol, Indrora, Sanand, Jhalora, Wadu & Nandej etc. 
Interestingly, Indrora-1 was drilled in 1971 is still producing oil on self from
high pressured Cambay Shale Reservoir “Indrora Shale Pay”, though in
small quantity.  Similarly wells like K-165 produced oil from Younger
Cambay Shale for long (over 30 years), though at low rate.
4. Geologically, prodelta shale facies equivalent to Chhatral, Mehsana and
Mandhali members of arenaceous Kadi Formation form the shale reservoir
in Younger Cambay Shale.  Shales associated with thin silts, silt streaks or
silt laminations and microfractures act as reservoir in Cambay Shale  Pure
shales may offer additional potential for “Shale Gas” due to adsorptions of
natural gas on shale surface which can be assessed based organic maturity. 
Dual porosity and dual permeability mechanism is responsible for oil & gas
production from low permeability tight reservoir of Cambay Shale  Tripple
 porosity and dual permeability model is applicable for “Shale Gas”
production from Cambay Shale
5. Unconventional hydrocarbon reservoirs act as source as well as reservoir
itself  Relatively thicker (500-1500m) and laterally continuous  Low
permeability Tight Gas Sands fall in this category.  Shales are most
prominent among them, next CBM.  Low permeability shaly sandstone and
siltstone have stratigraphic deposition with migrated or insitu HC
accumulation  Have no free water or hydrocarbon-water contact being
dominantly argillaceous with more of bound water than free water.
6. Formation evaluation:  It was difficult to identify HC bearing zones by
conventional logs due to their low resistivity and high water saturation,
interesting sections were picked up based on resistivity build up or kinks 
Overlay of density-neutron porosity was used when available in new wells. 
New concept of “Shale Resistivity Ratio” was applied based on analogy with
US Gulf of Mexico as applicable to high pressure shales  Intervals having
SRR of 1.6-3.0 considered as “commercial”, 3.0-3.5 as “Small” and more
than 3.5 “Non-commercial” hydrocarbon bearing zones  The concept was
applied in newly drilled wells of Sanand, Jhalora, Wadu, Kalol, Indrora ,
Nandej etc for testing or identification of bypassed pays in old wells in shale
section, which proved very effective.  Conventional Sw calculation
indicated very high waster saturation (70-100%) to which 20-40% shale
correction was applied for testing in shale reservoir because of their clayey
nature having more bound water than free water.  As a thumb rule 1/6th of
perf. interval in shale was considered as pay for estimation of reserves
7. Drilling and production:  Oil production from Cambay Shale reservoir
which was initially @30- 50m3/d declined fast to 3-5m3/d  Wells required
repeated HF for sustained production.  Wells when ceased production or
became uneconomical, transferred to higher conventional sandstone/siltstone
reservoirs.  Vertical drilling and basic fracturing (30-40 tons) applied at
that time could not enhance productivity for long.  Options were either to
drill a vertical well and frac or drill directional for enhanced production from
tight silt or shale reservoirs  Deviated drilling and MWD logging
techniques were first time applied in a Wadu well, which produced about
40m3/d oil and 27,000m3/d gas on self flow.  There was no technology to
fracture a deep well, greater than 2000m earlier due to which wells like
Jabera-1, which gave gas about 5000m3/d from Vindhyan Sandstone at
2450-2460m depth had to be abandoned.
8. Technology improved over the years, especially in last decade for formation
evaluation, horizontal drilling and multistage fracturing, especially in US
 and Canada which resulted in making unconventional tight reservoirs
attractive hydrocarbon resources.  At present, unconventional reservoirs of
Shale Gas, Tight Gas Sand and CBM contribute about 40% of natural gas
production in the US.  Shale Gas has become a hot resource and buzz word
now world over.  In India, shale gas venture has just begun, whereas CBM
is at threshold and Tight Gas Sand production is obtained knowingly or
unknowingly.  New technologies of formation evaluation, horizontal
drilling, multistage fracturing, microseismic monitoring applied for Tight
Hydrocarbon Reservoir Development first time in a Cambay Field well in
the Basin on analogy with US Shale Gas technology.
9. The well was drilled to 2740m (TVD 1760m) with horizontal section of
(>600m) in Tight Siltstone Reservoir of Eocene in Cambay Field 
Completed with 5/12” tubing in 8-1/2” open hole using sliding sleeves and
swellable packers.  Undergone multistage fracturing (8 stages) by pumping
about 1200 tons of proppant @130-150/ton per stage against normal 30-40
ton/job.  Fracturing trend has been monitored by microseismic survey to
define fracture geometry and permeability trend in the reservoir for further
development and production enhancement.  The well is expected to
produce 300,000-500,000 m3/d against the normal production of 30,000-
50,000m3/d with conventional technology.
10. • Sophisticated proprietary log interpretation • Curves generated include: –
Shale Permeability * – Porosity – TOC * – Variable Density – Lithologies –
Free Gas * – Sw – Bulk Volume Irreducible * – Free Water * – Effective
Porosity – Free Fluid Volume – Volume of Hydrocarbons • Results
identified high potential zones in the Eocene section Type Cambay Well EP-
II EP-III EP-IV Marker Base EP-IV EP-II EP-III EP-IV Base EP-IV
11.140 - 400m gross interval 3 large pay zones (X, Y and Z) Further possible
tight pay zones below Z zone Cambay-23z Cambay-40 Deccan Cambay-
73Cambay-19z OSII Top Eocene 2 km EW X Zone Y Zone Z Zone
Cambay-23z Cambay-40 Deccan Cambay-73Cambay-19z OSII Top Eocene
2 km2 km EW X Zone Y Zone Z Zone X Zone Y Zone Z Zone
12.76H Heel76H Toe Y Top X Top OSIICasing Point Cambay-XH NW SE
610m
13.Cambay Well Drilling & Completion Schematic
14.Used open hole completion 9-5/8"x 5-1/2" liner hanger packer, 5-1/2"
tubing, 10 water- swellable packers, 16 stimulation sleeves (2 sleeves per
stage). Frac sleeves were actuated by dropping a ball matched to their
respective seat sizes. The fracturing treatment commenced by pumping an
injection test, completed in 8 days Long-term overnight shut-in performed
 after each fracturing stage resulted in one fracture treatment per day. The last
two stages (stage 7 and 8) were pumped on the same day. Propped fracture
geometry estimates to be carried out
15.Extensive artificial fractures increases the surface area exposed Fluid +
proppant pumped into well bore at pressure US example.
16. Microseismic Operations  8 Frac treatments at the Well C-XH monitored
over period of 8 days.  Used Passive Seismic Emission Tomography
(PSET®) technology to image the microseismic activity resulting from the
fracture treatment.  Indian-based seismic company recorded 56.94 hours of
data, processed 16.3 hours.  Event signal strength generally weak, noise
levels high due to cultural activity  Velocity model initially calibrated by a
perforation shot in an offset well.  Mechanical ball drop events during
fraccing provided additional calibration.  Extracted 617 microseismic
events, 229 mechanical events.  Location errors less than +/-15 metres in
horizontal and vertical directions
17.991 stations in array represented by red lines.  Station spacing is 20 metres
 Array consists of 10 lines radiating out from the well head  High fold,
wide azimuth & large aperture coverage of 20.25 sq. km.  Cambay XH well
path shown by yellow dashed line  Data acquired using Aram Aries II
recording system at 2 ms sampling rate provided by IOT.
18.The applied new technologies for production enhancement from tight
hydrocarbon reservoirs in Cambay Basin can be suitably applied in other
basins of India having similar reservoirs like KG, Cauvery, Assam-Arakan,
Rajasthan, Vindhyan and Gondwana.  Advantage with Indian basins is
large multiple pay thickness (300- 700m), moderate depths (1700-3700m),
better porosity and permeability with evidence of hydrocarbons while
drilling.  Application of new technologies will help in making deeper,
thicker and tighter hydrocarbon reservoirs commercially producer, thus
contributing to the growing demand significantly in the country.