The Influence of Acid on the RockMechanical Characteristics of Deep Shale in theWujiaping Formation

The microscopic characteristics and mechanical properties of rocks change after the action of acid on deep shale,which affects the fracturing effect.Accordingly,we designed and conducted indoor experiments related to the changes in macro and microscopic characteristics after the interaction of acid with the shale of Wujiaping Formation,based on which the characteristic law of fracture volume modification after acid fracturing was studied using numerical simulation.The results demonstrate that the pores and fractures are enlarged and the structure is significantly loosened after the acid immersion.And a 15%concentration of hydrochloric acid can effectively dissolve shale.Furthermore,the degree of acid-etching reaction is highly variable because of the different carbonate content,which reveals the strong inhomogeneity of the shale system in the Wujiaping Group reservoir section.After the acid interacted with the shale rock samples,the triaxial compressive strength,elastic modulus,and Poisson’s ratio of shale decreased.Moreover,the evaluation of the effect after acid fracturing simulated by fracturing software revealed that the smaller the value of elastic modulus in shale-based reservoirs,the more favorable the fracture volume modification.This discovery not only provides a theoretical basis for the expansion and extension patterns of acid-fracturing in carbonaceous shale formations but also offers research methods and theoretical insights for the fundamental exploration of other deep-seated oil and gas resources.

Numerical Analysis of Residual Strength in the Perforated Casing of Ultra Deep Wells

A three-dimensional model for the numerical simulation of casing-cement behavior is used to investigate residual strength in the perforated casing of ultra deep wells.The influence of the hole diameter,hole density and phase angle on the residual strength of the casing under non-uniform stress and fracturing conditions is revealed through the consideration of different perforation parameters.It is shown that the residual strength of the casing increases with the hole diameter and periodically changes with the hole density;the phase angle is the main factor that affects the residual strength of the perforated casing,and the perforation should be avoided in the direction of the minimum principal stress to reduce stress concentration at the perforation hole.Moreover,as shown by a companion orthogonal experiment,the descending order of influence of the different influential parameters is:phase angle,hole diameter,hole density and the thickness of casing.

Geomechanics involved in gas hydrate recovery

Gas hydrate is regarded as a promising energy owing to the large carbon reserve and high energy density.However,due to the particularity of the formation and the complexity of exploitation process,the commercial exploitation of gas hydrate has not been realized.This paper reviews the physical properties of gas hydratebearing sediments and focuses on the geomechanical response during the exploitation.The exploitation of gas hydrate is a strong thermal–hydrological–mechanical–chemical(THMC)coupling process:decomposition of hydrate into water and gas produces multi-physical processes including heat transfer,multi-fluid flow and deformation in the reservoir.These physical processes lead to a potential of geomechanical issues during the production process.Frequent occurrence of sand production is the major limitation of the commercial exploitation of gas hydrate.The potential landslide and subsidence will lead to the cessation of the production and even serious accidents.Preliminary researches have been conducted to investigate the geomechanical properties of gas hydrate-bearing sediments and to assess the wellbore integrity during the exploitation.The physical properties of hydrate have been fully studied,and some models have been established to describe the physical processes during the exploitation of gas hydrate.But the reproduction of actual conditions of hydrate reservoir in the laboratory is still a huge challenge,which will inevitably lead to a bias of experiment.In addition,because of the effect of microscopic mechanisms in porous media,the coupling mechanism of the existing models should be further investigated.Great efforts,however,are still required for a comprehensive understanding of this strong coupling process that is extremely different from the geomechanics involved in the conventional reservoirs.

The influence of earthquakes on Zhubi Reef in the Nansha Islands of the South China Sea

It is exceedingly important to estimate the stability of coral reefs. In recent years, growing construction projects have been carried out on the reef flat in the South China Sea. As a special marine geotechnical medium, it is made of the reef debris underwent overwhelmingly long geological age. Reefs grow thickly on the carbonate platform after the Late Oligocene and have five to six main sedimentary facies. It can be used as a recorder to measure the occurrence time of recent earthquake. A model of reef body is presented to study the influence of earthquakes according to the geological structure characteristic of reefs in the Nansha Islands. Furthermore, Geo Studio is used to simulate stress and deformation situations within it under various earthquake intensities. A safety factor is calculated by the limit equilibrium method, and the possible scenarios of earthquake-induced landslides and sliding scale are defined with a Newmark sliding block method, as well as stress distribution and deformation behaviors. Therefore, the numerical results suggest that the connections between the coral reef and the earthquake are as follows：（1） the reef body has a good stability under self-gravity state;（2） after the earthquake, it may cause slope＇s instability and bring out slumping when the safety factor is smaller than 1（FS〈1）;（3） the safety factor decreases with the increasing earthquake intensity, and fluctuates around a particular value after a while;and（4） as a new developed part of the reef, the smaller shallow landslide will be easily subject to collapse caused by the earthquake. It is concluded that it is feasible to provide a reference for evaluating the stability of coral reef using a geotechnical engineering simulation method. This can help the engineering constructions in the South China Sea.

Progress and Development Direction of “Three-High” Oil and Gas Well Testing Technology

By reviewing the development of “three-high” oil and gas well testing technology of Sinopec in recent years, this paper systematically summarizes the application of “three-high” oil and gas well testing technology of Sinopec in engineering optimization design technology, and high temperature and high pressure testing technology, high pressure and high temperature transformation completion integration technology. Major progress has been made in seven aspects: plug removal and re-production technology of production wells in high acid gas fields;wellbore preparation technology of ultra-deep, high-pressure, and high-temperature oil and gas wells;surface metering technology;and supporting tool development technology. This paper comprehensively analyzes the challenges faced by the “three-high” oil and gas well production testing technology in four aspects: downhole tools, production testing technology, safe production testing, and the development of low-cost production test tools. Four development directions are put forward: 1) Improve ultra-deep oil and gas testing technology and strengthen integrated geological engineering research. 2) Deepen oil and gas well integrity evaluation technology to ensure the life cycle of oil and gas wells. 3) Carry out high-end, customized, and intelligent research on oil test tools to promote the low-cost and efficient development of ultra deep reservoirs. 4) Promote the fully automatic control of the surface metering process to realize the safe development of “three-high” reservoirs.

Indosinian Supergene Karsts in the Qaidam Basin,NW China:Evidence from Paleo-tectonics,Paleoclimates and Paleo-fluids

In the Qaidam basin,Northwest China,karstic fissures and caves are developed in many places of the Lower Carboniferous Chengqianggou Fm.and Huaitoutala Fm.and the Upper Carboniferous Keluke Fm.,in which are found typical karstic marks.Several suites of transgressive carbonate rocks formed during the Late Paleozoic epoch are preserved as reservoir properties in the Qaidam basin,with paleokarst-related cave-fractured diagenetic structures,which provided the basis for cavefractured development.Carbonate and clastic samples covering or infilling caves and fractures in Carboniferous strata were collected in the eastern Qaidam basin to focus on petrological and geochemical analyses of karst and infilling materials.Based on this study of the Caledonian diagenetic sequence,and bitumen-infilled inclusion temperature and burial history,there existed a continuous atmospheric freshwater leaching process,which played a critical role in the construction of the Carboniferous supergene paleokarsts.Investigation and survey of the tectonic setting,plate paleolatitude and river development intensity also proves that there was abundant rainfall during the Indosinian period,after which the strata undergo a shallow burial process.Because Indosinian period is earlier than the key timing of hydrocarbon-generation of the Carboniferous source rocks,this kind of karst reservoir has potential significance for oil-gas resources in this area.

Model predictive control and improved low-pass filtering strategies based on wind power fluctuation mitigation

The rapid development of renewable energy sources such as wind power has brought great challenges to the power grid. Wind power penetration can be improved by using hybrid energy storage(ES) to mitigate wind power fluctuation. We studied the strategy of smoothing wind power fluctuation and the strategy of hybrid ES power distribution. Firstly, an effective control strategy can be extracted by comparing constant-time low-pass filtering(CLF), variable-time low-pass filtering(VLF), wavelet packet decomposition(WPD), empirical mode decomposition(EMD) and model predictive control algorithms with fluctuation rate constraints of the identical grid-connected wind power. Moreover, the mean frequency of ES as the cutoff frequency can be acquired by the Hilbert Huang transform(HHT), and the time constant of filtering algorithm can be obtained. Then, an improved low-pass filtering algorithm(ILFA) is proposed to achieve the power allocation between lithium battery(LB) and supercapacitor(SC), which can overcome the over-charge and over-discharge of ES in the traditional low-pass filtering algorithm(TLFA). In addition, the optimized LB and SC power are further obtained based on the SC priority control strategy combined with the fuzzy control(FC) method. Finally, simulation results show that wind power fluctuation can be effectively suppressed by LB and SC based on the proposed control strategies, which is beneficial to the development of wind and storage system.

Numerical modeling of the critical pipeline inclination for the elimination of the water accumulation on the pipe floor in oil-water fluid flow

In this work,numerical models were developed to investigate the critical inclination of a pipeline to eliminate the water accumulation at the floor of the pipe carrying oil-water fluid.Computational fluid dynamics software was used to establish a geometric model of the pipe with various inclination angles,and a grid-independent verification was conducted to determine a reasonable meshing method.Quantitative relationships were determined between the pipe inclination angle and the affecting factors including the flow velocity,viscosity and the pipe diameter,where the water accumulation would not be able to occur.Generally,the critical inclination angle increases with the fluid flow velocity.The refluxing of water is the key mechanism causing the water accumulation at the bottom of the pipe.In addition to the fluid flow velocity,an increase in fluid viscosity and a decrease in the pipe diameter cause an increase of the critical inclination angle that the water phase can be carried away by oil.The model can be used to determine the critical inclination of pipelines carrying oil-water fluid to cause the water accumulation and the operating conditions that can eliminate the accumulation of water phase at the pipe floor.