Construction of pore structure and lithology of digital rock physics based on laboratory experiments

• Published in: Journal of petroleum exploration and production technology Vol. 11; no. 5; pp. 2113 - 2125
• Main Authors: Huang, Chenzhi, Zhang, Xingde, Liu, Shuang, Li, Nianyin, Kang, Jia, Xiong, Gang
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cham Springer International Publishing 01.05.2021; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Computed tomography; Cores; Earth and Environmental Science; Earth Sciences; Energy Systems; Experiments; Filtration; Gas fields; Geology; Industrial and Production Engineering; Industrial Chemistry/Chemical Engineering; Kriging interpolation; Laboratories; Lithology; Mercury; Microprocessors; Model accuracy; Monitoring/Environmental Analysis; NMR; Nuclear magnetic resonance; Offshore Engineering; Oil and gas fields; Original Paper-Production Engineering; Particle size distribution; Physics; Pore size; Pore size distribution; Porosity; Reservoirs; Rocks; Scanning; Shape; Size distribution; Statistical methods; Technology; Tomography; X-ray diffraction; Digital rock physics; Mineral composition; X-ray diffraction technology; Threshold segmentation
• ISSN: 2190-0558; 2190-0566
• DOI: 10.1007/s13202-021-01149-7

The development and stimulation of oil and gas fields are inseparable from the experimental analysis of reservoir rocks. Large number of experiments, poor reservoir properties and thin reservoir thickness will lead to insufficient number of cores, which restricts the experimental evaluation effect of cores. Digital rock physics (DRP) can solve these problems well. This paper presents a rapid, simple, and practical method to establish the pore structure and lithology of DRP based on laboratory experiments. First, a core is scanned by computed tomography (CT) scanning technology, and filtering back-projection reconstruction method is used to test the core visualization. Subsequently, three-dimensional median filtering technology is used to eliminate noise signals after scanning, and the maximum interclass variance method is used to segment the rock skeleton and pore. Based on X-ray diffraction technology, the distribution of minerals in the rock core is studied by combining the processed CT scan data. The core pore size distribution is analyzed by the mercury intrusion method, and the core pore size distribution with spatial correlation is constructed by the kriging interpolation method. Based on the analysis of the core particle-size distribution by the screening method, the shape of the rock particle is assumed to be a more practical irregular polyhedron; considering this shape and the mineral distribution, the DRP pore structure and lithology are finally established. The DRP porosity calculated by MATLAB software is 32.4%, and the core porosity measured in a nuclear magnetic resonance experiment is 29.9%; thus, the accuracy of the model is validated. Further, the method of simulating the process of physical and chemical changes by using the digital core is proposed for further study.