Lecture Topic:Quantifying the Effective Porosity of Reservoir and Source Rocks

Lecture Time:Wednesday, Jul. 3, 2019,15:00-17:00

Lecture Location:Mingbian Building D404

Lecturer: Hu Qinhong, Professor at UT-Arlington

Abstract:Microscopic pore structure characteristics of both reservoir and source rocks (e.g., sandstones, carbonates, and mudrocks) –pore-size distribution, pore shape, and pore connectivity – control fluid flow and hydrocarbon movement. Focusing on effective porosity, the portion of connected pore space as conductive pathways to participate in flow and movement, this presentation discusses various approaches to quantifying the effective porosity for a range of oil and gas reservoir and source rocks. The approaches include pycnometry (liquid and gas), pore and bulk volume measurement after vacuum saturation, porosimetry (mercury intrusion porosimetry, low-pressure gas physisorption isotherm, water vapor adsorption/desorption isotherm, nuclear magnetic resonance cyroporometry), imaging (X-ray computed tomography, Wood’s metal impregnation, field emission-scanning electron microscopy SEM, focus ion beam-SEM), scattering (ultra- and small-angle neutron), the utility of both hydrophilic and hydrophobic fluids as well as fluid invasion tests (imbibition, diffusion, vacuum saturation) followed by laser ablation-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry imaging of different nm-sized tracers. Our results indicate a disparate characteristics and range of effective porosity, with a single-zone behavior and a value of connectivity at approximately 70% for sandstones, as compared to “dual-connectivity zones” at 70% and 0.01% for mudrocks.

About the Lecturer: Professor Hu received his Ph.D. from the University of Arizona in 1995. He worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory from 1997 to 2000. He has served as an assistant researcher at the University of Arizona, a scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, a scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, an assistant professor at the University of Texas at Arlington, and subsequently a tenured associate professor and professor at UT-Arlington. He has directed more than 80 research projects funded by government institutions and companies in the US and China. He has published more than 150 SCI papers with a Google Scholar h index of 32 and 3882 citations. He is currently the editor-in-chief of Marine and Petroleum Geology, an internationally renowned journal in the field of petroleum geology. He is also the deputy editor of four other SCI journals, including AAPG Bulletin.

Host Organization:Innovation Base for High-Efficiency Development of Deep Marine Shale Gas

Supporting Organizations:

Department of Science and Technology

Sichuan Provincial Laboratory of Natural Gas Geology

School of Geoscience

Sichuan Provincial Institute of Shale Gas Industry Development

State Key Laboratory of Oil and Gas Reservoir Geology and Exploitation