A FRACTAL MODEL FOR GAS APPARENT PERMEABILITY IN MICROFRACTURES OF TIGHT/SHALE RESERVOIRS

Abstract

The investigation of gas transport in microfractures of tight/shale reservoirs can provide potential applications in predicting shale gas production rates. In this paper, analytical expressions for flow rate and apparent permeability are derived based on the fractal theory and the superposition of convection and molecular diffusion transfer. The proposed model relates the flow rate and apparent permeability to the microstructural parameters of tight/shale reservoirs, gas properties, the ambient pressure as well as temperature. The model predictions from the present model are compared with existing experimental data sets and are found to be consistent with existing experimental measurements. The effects of microstructural parameters of tight/shale reservoirs on apparent permeability are also investigated. The results show that apparent permeability increases with temperature, the pore area fractal dimension, the porosity as well as the maximum microfracture width and decreases with the tortuosity fractal dimension and the mean pressure.