Understanding hydraulic fracture propagation behavior in tight sandstone–coal interbedded formations: an experimentalinvestigation

作     者：Peng Tan Yan Jin Liang Yuan Zhen-Yu Xiong Bing Hou Mian Chen Li-Ming Wan 

作者机构：State Key Laboratory of Petroleum Resources and Engineering China University of Petroleum CNPC Engineering Technology R&D Company Limited SINOPEC Shanghai O shore Oil & Gas Company 

出 版 物：《Petroleum Science》 (石油科学（英文版）)

年 卷 期：2019年第16卷第1期

页      面：148-160页

核心收录：

学科分类：0820[工学-石油与天然气工程] 08[工学] 

基　　金：the support from the National Science and Technology Major Projects of China(Grant No.2016ZX05066) Major Program of National Natural Science Foundation of China(Grant No.51490650) PetroChina Innovation Foundation(No.2018D-5007-0307) 

主　　题：Hydraulic fracturing Fracture propagation Sandstone-coal interbed Layered formation 

摘      要：Whether hydraulic fractures could connect multiple gas zones in the vertical plane is the key to fracturing treatment to jointly exploit coalbed methane and tight sandstone gas through integrative hydraulic fracturing in tight sandstone–coal interbedded formations. Laboratory true triaxial hydraulic fracturing experiments were conducted on layered specimens with di erent combination types of natural sandstone and coal to simulate the propagation behavior of hydraulic fractures. The effects of the fracture initiation position, fracturing fluid viscosity and injection rate were discussed. The results showed that di erent fracture morphologies could be found. When initiating from coal seams, three patterns of fracture initiation and propagation were obtained:(1) The main hydraulic fracture initiated and propagated along the natural fractures and then diverged due to the effects of in situ stress and formed secondary fractures.(2) The hydraulic fracture initiated and propagated in the direction of the maximum horizontal stress.(3) Multiple fractures initiated and propagated at the same time. With the same fracturing fluid viscosity and injection rate, the hydraulic fractures initiating in sandstones had greater chances than those in coal seams to penetrate interfaces and enter neighboring layers. Excessively small or large fracturing fluid viscosity and injection rate would do harm to the vertical extension height of the induced fracture and improvement of the stimulated reservoir volume. Compared with operation parameters(fracturing fluid viscosity and injection rate), the natural weak planes in coals were considered to be the key factor that a ected the fracture propagation path. The experimental results would make some contributions to the development of tight sandstone–coal interbedded reservoirs.