PETROLEUM EXPLORATION AND DEVELOPMENT

Volume 45, Issue 4, August 2018

Online English edition of the Chinese language journal

Cite this article as: PETROL. EXPLOR. DEVELOP., 2018, 45(4): 685–697. RESEARCH PAPER

Development of the theory and technology for low

permeability reservoirs in China
HU Wenrui1,*, WEI Yi2, BAO Jingwei3
1. China National Petroleum Corporation, Beijing 100724, China;
2. SINOPEC Petroleum Exploration and Production Research Institute, Beijing 100083, China;
3. Research Institute of Petroleum Exploration & Development, PetroChina, Beijing 100083, China

Abstract: The development theories of low-permeability oil and gas reservoirs are refined, the key development technologies are
summarized, and the prospect and technical direction of sustainable development are discussed based on the understanding and research
on developed low-permeability oil and gas resources in China. The main achievements include: (1) the theories of low-permeability
reservoir seepage, dual-medium seepage, relative homogeneity, etc. (2) the well location optimization technology combining favorable
area of reservoir with gas-bearing prediction and combining pre-stack with post-stack; (3) oriented perforating multi-fracture, multistage
sand adding, multistage temporary plugging, vertical well multilayer, horizontal and other fracturing techniques to improve productivity
of single well; (4) the technology of increasing injection and keeping pressure, such as overall decreasing pressure, local pressurization,
shaped charge stamping and plugging removal, fine separate injection, mild advanced water injection and so on; (5) enhanced recovery
technology of optimization of injection-production well network in horizontal wells. To continue to develop low-permeability reserves
economically and effectively, there are three aspects of work to be done well: (1) depending on technical improvement, continue to
innovate new technologies and methods, establish a new mode of low quality reservoir development economically, determine the main
technical boundaries and form replacement technology reserves of advanced development; (2) adhering to the management system of low
cost technology & low cost, set up a complete set of low-cost dual integration innovation system through continuous innovation in
technology and management; (3) striving for national preferential policies.

Key words: low permeability oil and gas reservoir; seepage theory; volume fracturing; waterflooding technology; well location
optimization; horizontal well; technical development direction

1. Introduction growing rapidly year by year[3], from the consumption of

Along with the rapid economic development in China, the
demand for oil is constantly growing, but the production in-
crease lags behind, as a result, the gap between the demand
and production has been growing wider, the net crude oil im-
port volume has been increasing, and the dependence on for-
eign oil has been rising year by year. In 2016, the oil con-
sumption of China was 5.78108 t, the net oil import volume
was 3.78108 t, representing the dependence degree on the
foreign oil of 65.40%[12]. In recent years, the dependence on
foreign oil has been going up, up to now the monthly oil im-
port volume of China has surpassed the USA, ranking the first
in the world.
Fortunately, the natural gas has alleviated the oil supply
stress to some extent and safeguarded the sustainable develop-
ment of national economy. With the increase of natural gas
production, the natural gas consumption in China has been
245.03×108 m3 in 2000 to 2 000108 m3 in 2016[4], China
became a natural gas net import country in 2007, and the im-
port volume was 733108 m3 in 2016, representing the de-
pendence degree on the foreign oil of 36.65%[5]. With the in-
creasing dependence on the foreign oil and gas, it is urgent to
speed up the petroleum exploration and development, improve
oil and gas production, to alleviate the contradiction between
the oil-gas supply and demand in China and safeguard the
national energy security.
About 38% oil and gas in the world and about 46% oil and
gas resources in China are of low quality largely in low per-
meability reservoirs, and the exploitation of this kind of re-
source is of vital strategic importance for the sustainable pe-
troleum development in China. The scale exploration and
development of low permeability oil gas field has been always
a major engineering problem all over the world and also the
frontier subject of oilfield development engineering.

Received date: 26 Mar. 2018; Revised date: 28 May 2018.

* Corresponding author. E-mail: hwr@petrochina.com.cn
Copyright © 2018, Research Institute of Petroleum Exploration & Development, PetroChina. Publishing Services provided by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of KeAi Com-
munications Co., Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
 HU Wenrui et al. / Petroleum Exploration and Development, 2018, 45(4): 685–697
In 1995, the extra-low permeability Ansai oilfield was put
into industrial development, marking China has officially
entered the low permeability development era. Through con-
stant endeavor, the exploration of low permeability resource
in china has made some great discoveries, especially in the
recent twenty years, large amount of reserve of this kind has
been discovered. With the research and innovation in devel-
opment technologies and deepening in understanding on low
permeability reservoirs, a series of technologies has been de-
veloped and improved gradually for the development of low
permeability fields, enabling the extensive effective develop-
ment of low permeability resources[6].
Based on understanding and research on developed low-
permeability oil and gas resources in China, we have distilled
the development theory for low permeability oil and gas res-
ervoirs, summarized key technologies for the development of
low permeability oil and gas reservoirs, and discussed the
future of sustainable development and technical orientation, in
the hope to guide the future exploration and development of
low permeability oil gas reservoirs in China.
2. Low permeability oil gas resources in China
Low permeability reservoirs refer to the reservoirs that are
difficult to realize effective and extensive development with
conventional development techniques, including low permea-
bility sandstone, carbonate rock, and volcanic rock reservoirs
etc., and the key wording is “difficult to develop with conven-
tional techniques”, that is to say they can only be developed
effectively by using “special stimulation technologies[6]”.
Low permeability is a relative concept, its defining stand-
ards and limits are different due to different national policies,
resource situation and economic technical conditions around
the world[7]. Even in the same country or the same region, the
standard and concept of low permeability reservoir is con-
stantly evolving along with the deepening of recognition and
technical progress.
Referring to the development of worldwide low permea-
bility petroleum reservoirs and the successful practice in
China, especially the results of major development tests in
recent years, the low permeability reservoirs are classified
into average low permeability, extra-low permeability and
ultra-low permeability ones, hence the classification standard
is put forward[6] (Table 1).
According to the fourth round of petroleum resource
evaluation in 2016, the low permeability resources account for
24% of the prospective oil resources and 47.5% of prospective
natural gas resources in China. By the end of 2016, the proved
Table 1. Classification standard of low permeability reservoir.
Type of low per- Permeability/103 μm2
meability reservoir Oil Natural gas
Average low 1.010.0 1.05.0
Extra-low 0.51.0 0.11.0
Ultra-low <0.5 <0.1
 686 
low permeability oil reserves account for 12% of the cumula-
tive proved oil reserves and 39% of the cumulative natural gas
reserves in China. They are mainly distributed in nine oil
provinces, including Daqing, Jilin, Liaohe, Dagang, Xinjiang,
Changqing, Tuha, Shengli and Zhongyuan[810].
From the perspective of distribution horizons, more than
80% of low permeability oil resources in China are in the
Mesozoic and Cenozoic terrestrial formations, and more than
60% natural gas resources are in the Paleozoic and Triassic
marine formations[11]. Low permeability oil and gas resources
in China feature wide distribution, various reservoir types and
multiple formations.
Along with the deepening of cognition, technical progress
and management innovation, the low permeability oil gas
resources have been developed effectively in large scale, with
its production growing constantly and taking up bigger and
bigger proportion in the gross oil and gas production. In 2017,
the low permeability oil production of PetroChina accounts
for 36.8% of the total production, the gas from low per-
meability reservoirs made up 55% of the annual total. Clearly,
low permeability resources take a more and more important
position in the oilfield development and is becoming the main
body for the development.
3. Low permeability petroleum reservoirs
development theory
Compared with the medium-high permeability reservoirs,
low permeability reservoirs present different physical proper-
ties and complicated seepage characteristics. The classical low
permeability oil gas seepage theory is simple and practical,
but only considering the low permeability pore seepage and
not the relative heterogeneity and fracture seepage, it has
some limitation. Through the indoor experiment and numeri-
cal modelling and analysis of actual production data, a set of
practical development theory for the low permeability oil and
gas fields have been established.
3.1. Low permeability reservoir seepage theory
With small pore throats and poor connectivity, the low
permeability reservoir is complicated in seepage mechanism,
and the fluid flow in the reservoir shows the characteristics of
low velocity non-Darcy flow, rather than complying with the
typical Darcy’s law. On one hand the start-up pressure gradi-
ent remarkably impacts the seepage; on the other hand, with
the constant recovery of the fluid, the distribution of effective
stress changes, and the pore configuration changes with the
rock skeleton strain, which further impacts the seepage status
and enhances the non-linear seepage of low permeability res-
ervoir[1217].
3.1.1. Mechanism of low velocity non-Darcy seepage
Most fluid in the low permeability reservoir pore is close to
the solid surface, and the fluid is strongly adsorbed to the rock
pore wall during flow, meanwhile the physical-chemical
change at the rock surface greatly impacts the fluid flow,
 HU Wenrui et al. / Petroleum Exploration and Development, 2018, 45(4): 685–697
what’s more, the clay mineral expansion with water and parti-
cle migration strengthen the rock surface effect on the fluid
flow[14]. Therefore, for ultra-low permeability reservoirs, the
impact of rock surface boundary on the fluid cannot be ig-
nored due to strong solid-liquid action, causing the seepage
rule to deviate from the Darcy’s Law. The start-up pressure
gradient is the key parameter to characterize the low velocity
non-Darcy flow.
The start-up pressure gradient testing system can be
adopted to carry out the depletion simulation-based non-linear
seepage experiment on the low permeability core samples,
and the relationship curve between start-up pressure gradient
and permeability can be plotted (Fig. 1).
Taking the low permeability cores from the Ordos Basin as
examples, the regression analysis with experimental data re-
veals that there is a good power function relationship between
the start-up pressure gradient and the permeability (equation
(1)), namely with the increase of the permeability, the start-up
pressure gradient decreases gradually. The smaller the rock
permeability is, and the finer the throat is, the larger the pro-
portion of the boundary thickness adhering to the rock throat
wall accounting for the throat radius, the smaller the flow area
in the pore, the larger the resistance to overcome the dis-
placement fluid, and the larger the start-up pressure gradient
will be. There is an obvious inflection point on the start-up
pressure gradient curve with the permeability, namely there is
a critical value, when the permeability decreases below the
critical value, the start-up pressure gradient increases sharply.
G  0.060 8 K －1.152 2 (1)
Low permeability gas reservoirs share the same variation
rule, but under different water saturations, the power function
relationship between the start-up pressure gradient and per-
meability changes, the flow mechanism is more complicated
under low permeability.
When the water saturation is 50%:
G  0.015 9 K －0.569 2 (2)
When the water saturation is 30%:
G  0.002 4 K －0.834 3
When the water saturation is 15%:
G  0.000 2 K －1.374 4
Fig. 1. Relationship between the start-up pressure gradient and
permeability of the low permeability reservoir.
3.1.2. Mechanism of pressure-sensitive effect
Prior to the oilfield recovery, the overlying formation stress
on the reservoir rock, pore fluid pressure in the reservoir rock
and rock skeleton support can basically reach a state of bal-
ance. However, with the recovery of the formation fluid, the
pore pressure decreases constantly and the net overlying stress
exerting on the rock skeleton increases, making the rock pore
texture change with the variation of the net overlying stress,
which is manifested as the stress sensitivity of the rock.
From the low permeability core stress sensitivity experi-
ment, the variation of permeability with net overlying pres-
sure can be acquired (Fig. 2), and it can be seen that the low
permeability reservoir shows strong stress sensitivity, with the
increase of net overlying stress, the permeability decreases
constantly, but the decreasing amplitude gradually lessens.
During the experiment, when the net stress pressure reached a
certain value, it was released gradually. It can be seen that the
permeability gradually recovered with the decrease of the net
overlying pressure, but the recovery degree was low, thus the
permeability loss caused by stress sensitivity is irreversible.
In order to characterize the stress sensitivity effect, the
concept of stress sensitive coefficient is introduced to evaluate
the reservoir stress sensitivity and describe the permeability
variation rule with the effective stress. The stress sensitive
coefficient can be expressed as:
 

lg K K i  (5)
lg   i 
Taking the low permeability core samples from the Ordos
Basin as examples, the stress sensitivity coefficients of sam-
ples with different permeabilities were calculated by using the
experimental data, and the regression analysis reveals that
there is a good power function relationship between the stress
sensitivity coefficient and initial permeability (equation (6)),
namely the smaller the permeability is, the larger the stress
sensitivity coefficient and the stronger the sensitivity will be;
when the permeability decreases below the critical value, the
(3) stress sensitivity coefficient increases sharply, and the impact
of stress sensitivity increases substantially (Fig. 3).
  0.1531Ki0.343 (6)
(4)
Fig. 2. Permeability variation curves of low permeability sam-
ple sensitive to stress.
 687 
 HU Wenrui et al. / Petroleum Exploration and Development, 2018, 45(4): 685–697
Fig. 3. Relationship between the stress sensitivity coefficient and
initial permeability of the low permeability reservoir.
3.1.3. Action mechanism of slippage effect
A lot of experiments demonstrate that if the same core and
gas is measured under different average pressures, the meas-
ured absolute permeability is different. When the gas flows in
small pores and complicated throats under a relatively low
pressure, the gas maintains the low velocity seepage state,
because molecular force between the gas and solid is far
smaller than that between the liquid and solid, the gas mole-
cule cannot be bound to the pore wall as the liquid molecule,
and some gas molecules at the pore wall are still at a move-
ment state, meanwhile due to the momentum transfer the gas
molecules in the neighboring layer together with the gas mol-
ecules at the pore wall moves directionally along the pore wall,
where the flow rate is not zero, indicating the slippage effect
of the gas.
The gas slippage effect can be characterized with the slip-
page factor, which is related to the rock pore texture, gas
property and average pore pressure, and can be used to de-
scribe the intensity of gas slippage effect. The experimental
data regression of Kirschner permeability test on low perme-
ability core samples from the Ordos Basin shows that there is
a good power function relationship between the slippage fac-
tor and Kirschner permeability, namely, the slippage factor
decreases with the increase of Kirschner permeability.
b  0.072 K 
0.29
(7)
The impact of slippage effect on the production depends on
the permeability and gas reservoir pressure, the smaller the
permeability and gas reservoir pressure, the more remarkable
the impact of slippage effect will be.
3.2. Dual-medium seepage theory
Generally, if the effective permeability of the reservoir is
less than 0.5×103 μm2, the recovery rate mainly depends on
the fracture rather than the reservoir pore. But the real produc-
tion performance demonstrates that reservoir pores also play
an extremely important role during the development of low
permeability petroleum reservoirs. According to the idea that
recovery rate depends on fracture, the recovery rate of the
Ansai oilfield estimated is 18% at most, but in fact, the actual
 688 
recovery rate of the oilfield has reached 30% in 2018, 12%
higher than the estimation result, which is enough to show
that the effect of pores cannot be ignored during the develop-
ment of low permeability reservoirs.
During the initial stage of oil (gas) well production, the
fracture permeability is far larger than the matrix pore, thus
the fracture plays the major role in fluid flow, and the fluid in
the fractures rapidly flows into the wellbore. But the fractures
are small in total volume, low in storing capacity and strong in
stress sensitivity, as the fluid in fracture is produced, the frac-
ture system pressure would decline, and the fractures, gradu-
ally closing or half closing, decrease substantially in conduc-
tivity, and thus oil (gas) well productivity drops significantly;
during the middle and late stage of production, with the re-
duction of fracture system pressure, pressure difference occurs
between the matrix and fracture, causing the fluid in the ma-
trix to flow toward the fracture, hereafter the matrix pore
plays the dominant role in seepage and constantly supplies
fluid to the fracture and wellbore. The seepage is character-
ized by dual- medium and mainly controlled by the throat size
and capillary force, with pore seepage working principally
and fracture seepage as supplement[6]. The oil (gas) well pro-
duction performance shows high production and quick decline
in the initial stage; and low production, slow decline rate and
long stable production period in the middle-late stage.
The lab experiment and actual production demonstrate that
the low permeability reservoirs have complex seepage mech-
anisms; stress sensitivity effect and start-up pressure gradient
have strong impact on seepage; and the fluid flow in the
matrix complies with the low velocity non-Darcy’s Law.
Assuming the fluid as single phase and slight compressible,
considering the mass exchange inside the matrix and between
the matrix and fracture, the model of matrix non-linear seep-
age can be constructed[1819].
  So m
   v m  qm1 ,m2  qm1 ,f  1
(8)
1
t
For the matrix, the kinetic equation considering the start-up
pressure gradient is:
K
v  10－9  p  G  (9)

The calculation model for the mass exchange between the
matrix and fracture is:
 K 
qm1 ,f   m1 ,f  
 m1  f  (10)
  m1
The calculation model for the mass exchange between the
matrices is:
 K 
qm1 ,m2   m1 ,m2  
 m2  m1  (11)
   m2
where   p  10－6  gD
The fracture presents strong stress sensitivity, where the
fluid flow complies with the Darcy’s Law; considering the
mass exchange inside the facture and between the fracture and
 HU Wenrui et al. / Petroleum Exploration and Development, 2018, 45(4): 685–697
matrix, the seepage model can be constructed.
  So f
   v f  qm1 ,f 
t
where v can be worked out from the Darcy’s Law:
K
v  10－9 p

The low permeability reservoir seepage model can be built
by combining the matrix and fracture seepage models and
considering start-up pressure gradient and stress sensitivity.
3.3. Relative homogeneity theory
During the development of low and extra-low permeability
oil gas fields, heterogeneity is a relative concept, involving
absolute heterogeneity in the relative homogeneity and large-
area relative homogenous reservoir constituted by countless
relatively homogeneous reservoirs. Although low permeability
reservoirs have narrow throat and strong heterogeneity gener-
ally, they contain local parts with relative homogeneity and
good connectivity where the flow complies with the Darcy’s
Law. In actual oilfield development, through reservoir de-
scription, the parts with “relative homogeneity” can be sought
out and developed by optimized program, which usually
achieves good results.
The major oil pay in the Ansai oilfield is the Chang-6 of
Triassic Yanchang Formation, which is the fluvial-control
delta sandstone reservoir with good permeability and small
permeability variation coefficient in the major part, and poor
permeability and great permeability variation coefficient in
the edge zone. According to the theory of “relative homoge-
neity”, the middle part of Chang-6 oil pay was selected for
water injection development test, during which, a large num-
ber of oil wells have achieved good effect with an average
daily oil production of 4.03 t, reserve producing degree of the
primary well pattern was up to 90.7%, and reserve controlling
degree by water-flooding was 73.6%; two years after water
injection, the water-drive control degree was 80.7% and effec-
tive degree of oil wells was 70%, and water-drive recovery
rate was predicted at 20%-25%.
3.4. Economic limit theory
The economic limit refers that the capital expenditures
(CAPEX) in each period of oilfield development must be
based on the maximum or stable output to carry out the
economy appraisal and calculate the pay-off period and profit,
if the input-output is rational, the development goes on, oth-
erwise the development ceases temporarily. The definition of
the development economic limit should: (1) fully understand
the enterprise and social benefits to develop this type of oil-
field; (2) set the basic target parameters for the economic limit
under the pre-condition of demonstration; (3) completely con-
sider the contribution of technical progress; (4) pre-estimate
the promotion effect of developing this type of oilfield to the
similar reserves[6].
Along with the gradual enhancement of development scale,
the reserves that can be produced in the low/extra-low per-
meability reservoir are poorer and poorer in quality, in order
(12) to effective exploit these reserves and keep the oil production
rising, it is necessary to set the investment limit per 104 t oil
productivity in accordance with the investment return stan-
(13) dard according to the current oil price (at present the standard
is 3×108 Yuan/104 t in China). In accordance with this stan-
dard, Changqing Oilfield has accomplished the construction
of about 1000×104 t productivity; later in order to develop the
oilfield with the productivity of less than 2 t/d, the basic in-
vestment standard was re-set as 5×108 Yuan/104 t, and
600×104 t productivity was constructed, which was imple-
mented in 2007 and has achieved good results.
Guided by the economic limit theory, while maintaining
rapid growth of oil and gas production and investment,
Changqing Oilfield has also made good economic profits,
with the return-on-investment rate keeping at a high level. In
2016, Changqing Oilfield realized the return-on-investment
rate of 6.36%, contributing second only after Daqing Oilfield
among all oilfield companies in PetroChina[6].
4. Key development technologies for low
permeability petroleum reservoirs
The economic and effective development of low permeabil-
ity oil gas resources is a worldwide problem. Through long-
term constant endeavors, Chinese researchers have developed
a series of development technologies of world leading level
by original creation or by integrating existent development
technologies for low permeability petroleum reservoirs, which
has supported the realization of extensive and effective de-
velopment of low permeability reservoirs. The solving of each
problem in the low permeability reservoir development is
accompanied by the substantial cognition leaping and techni-
cal breakthrough. During the long-term exploration and de-
velopment, effective lost cost development technologies and
matching processes for the low/extra-low permeability petro-
leum reservoirs have been worked out through exploration
and accumulation.
4.1. Early reservoir description technology
In the exploration appraisal period, the reservoir evaluation
should be started early, focusing on precise reservoir descrip-
tion. The geologic, seismic, logging and testing data are com-
prehensively employed by the interdisciplinary research teams
to quantitatively describe, characterize and predict the reser-
voir characteristics and establish the 3D or 4D reservoir geol-
ogy model. Meanwhile, according to the production perform-
ance in the test areas, the water injection characteristics of
different flow units should be determined and corresponding
adjustment policy be made, providing first hand data for
making scientific and detailed oilfield development program.
The early description greatly narrows the gap between the
exploration and development, speeds up the exploration
rhythm and development pace, promotes the integration of
exploration and development, which facilitates the rapid pro-
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 HU Wenrui et al. / Petroleum Exploration and Development, 2018, 45(4): 685–697
duction construction of low permeability petroleum reservoirs.
And the description mainly involves comprehensive reservoir
evaluation, reserve assessment and productivity appraisal, of
which the core is comprehensive reservoir evaluation. By
using the physical property evaluation of core samples, oil
testing and logging data of appraisal wells, the precise
“four-property” relationship is examined carefully by mathe-
matical statistics and key well verification methods to find out
the relationships between the reservoir lithology, physical
property, oiliness and electricity; secondly on the basis of
knowing the spatial correspondence between the flow units
and sedimentary microfacies, the spatial distribution pattern of
flow units are determined according to production perform-
ance to make injection adjustment and refine injection-pro-
duction management.
Learning from the development experience of Ansai oilfield,
researchers started early reservoir description in Jing’an oil-
field, deploying appraisal wells based on the prediction of
prospective regions and then carrying out the precise 3D res-
ervoir description using the exploration, appraisal and devel-
opment well data. Following the principle of “finding the best
among the poor, finding the high among the medium, and
selecting the rich among the lean” and technical route of “rich
earlier than poor, easy earlier than difficult, appraisal earlier
than ODP, testing earlier than development”, the oilfield real-
ized the goal of “simultaneous exploration and production
construction, investment and making profit”. Owing to the
integration of exploration and development, the annual oil
productivity of 100×104 t has been accomplished rapidly and
efficiently.
4.2. Well location selection in low permeability gas
reservoirs
The well location selection technology is to employ the
high precision digital 2D seismic P-wave pre-stack informa-
tion and conventional seismic post-stack gas-bearing informa-
tion to predict the effective reservoir in the screened hydro-
carbon region and select the well location, in which the preci-
sion of gas-bearing prediction is the key to improving the
success rate.
In order to improve the precision of reservoir prediction
and gas-bearing detection, through seismic survey parameter
Fig. 4. Technical flow of well location seclection in the Sulige gasfield.
 690 
optimization and field testing etc., the Changqing Oilfield has
developed the high precision 2D seismic survey technology
centered on digital geophone receiving, small trace space,
large offset, many folds and shooting below water level to get
high quality data, and the resulted pre-stack data can be di-
rectly applied to the gas-bearing detection, enhancing the pre-
cision of gas-bearing detection substantially.
In the development of Sulige gasfield of Changqing, ad-
hering to the route of “fluvial channel combined with gas-
bearing prediction, pre-stack combined with post-stack”, a set
of complete seismic-geologic well location selection work
flow around fluvial channel has been established (Fig. 4),
making the proportion of economic and effective wells rise
from the early 50% to 80%.
4.3. Fracturing reformation technology
For low and extra-low permeability tight sandstone reser-
voirs, the oil (gas) wells present low or none productivity, thus
the large scale fracturing is indispensable for the effective
production. In light with this issue, volume fracturing tech-
nology aiming at expanding the drainage area has been de-
veloped, which realized the transformation from the sin-
gle-fracture fracturing to multi-fracture fracturing and effec-
tively expanding the employment volume.
4.3.1. Directional perforating fracturing technology
The directional perforating fracturing technology is suitable
for tight reservoirs with the difference of maximum and mini-
mum principal stress of less than 5 MPa and thickness larger
than 10 m. The directional perforation changes the direction
of initial fracturing, forcing the fracture to change directions,
and thus creating many mutually-independent S-shaped frac-
tures on the plane in the same horizon to expand the drainage
volume controlled by the artificial fracture system and im-
prove the single-well production (Fig. 5).
Numerical simulation and physical modeling experiments
show that the decrease of horizontal stress difference will
cause the increase of fracture extending distance in the mini-
mum crustal stress direction and the enlargement of hydraulic
fracture steering radius during the directional perforating
fracturing, if the crustal stress difference exceeds 6 MPa, the
fracture steering will be difficult; when the perforation azi-
 HU Wenrui et al. / Petroleum Exploration and Development, 2018, 45(4): 685–697
Fig. 5. Diagram of directional volumetric perforation and
fracturing techniqe.
muth intersects with the maximum principal stress direction at
a certain angle, the fracture initiates first along the perforation
hole direction and then turns to the maximum principal stress
direction, moreover, if the intersection angle increases, the
fracturing steering radius also increases, and at present the
intersection angle is optimized at 45.
In the Changqing Oilfield, this technology has been applied
to 246 wells, with initial average oil increment of 0.40.8 t/d a
well, demonstrating a good overall effect.
4.3.2. Multistage sand fracturing technology
For the oil (gas) wells with thick reservoirs but without in-
terbeds in the reservoirs, proppant would likely precipitate in
the lower part of the reservoir in conventional fracturing be-
cause the proppant is placed unevenly vertically, thus the up-
per oil zone is difficult to be effectively reformed, and the
reserves cannot be fully employed. In multistage sand frac-
turing, the total sand is pumped into the reservoir through
multiple stages, and after the 1st stage fracturing the pumping
is stopped to wait for the proppant precipitation and fracture
closing, then the next stage fracturing is conducted, and step
by step. In the 2nd stage fracturing, with the preflush hindered
by the lower paving proppant, the downward extension of the
fracture is blocked, which forces the proppant to pave upward,
realizing the improvement of vertical proppant sand-paving
section to improve the fracture conductivity in the upper oil
zone.
In the Changqing Oilfield, this technology has been applied
in more than 2000 wells, increasing the average oil production
by 0.31.0 t/d than adjacent wells.
4.3.3. Multistage temporary plugging fracturing technology
For low permeability reservoirs with natural microfractures,
good sealing condition at top and bottom and small difference
of maximum and minimum principal stress, the temporary
plugging agent is added repetitiously to force fracture steering
and produce many secondary fractures, which can effectively
expand the drainage area. Owing to the initial fracturing frac-
tures, the oil (gas) recovery will create induced stress and
change the initial crustal stress state, which makes the fracture
steering possible during the repeated fracturing process.
The temporary plugging technology[2023] is to add tempo-
 691 
rary plugging agent to the formation during fracturing, after
the old fractures are opened, the mixture of temporary agent
and proppant enters the original fractures, accumulating in the
highly permeable zones to produce the filter cake bridge
blockage that stops the further extension of the fractures, thus
the subsequent fracture fluid cannot enter the fractures and
highly permeable zones, which causes the bottom-hole pres-
sure to rise. When the net pressure in the fracture reaches the
microfracture opening pressure or the new fracture breaking
pressure, the micro or new fractures open and then extend to
become new branch fractures along with the addition of sub-
sequent sand-carrying fluid to communicate the unproduced
oil gas zone. The temporary plugging agent would dissolve in
the formation water or the fracturing fluid after the operation,
thus it won’t cause secondary pollution.
The field application shows the temporary plugging frac-
turing can cause obvious rise of fracturing pressure, increase
of single well production, with stable or slightly drop of water
cut, realizing the purpose of water control and oil production
increase. From 2014 to 2015, the temporary plugging steering
repeated fracturing was implemented 46 well-times in the D1
oil zone in the Changqing Oilfield, with a success rate of
93.4%, an average single well oil production increment of
1.59 t/d, and water cut drop from 47.6% to 39.7%[2223].
4.3.4. Vertical well multi-layer fracturing technology
For the multi-layer low permeability gas reservoirs, in-
creasing producing layers of single well combined with vol-
ume fracturing can effectively improve the single well pro-
duction. For this purpose, new stratified fracturing technolo-
gies with coiled tubing with bottom packer and casing ce-
mentation sliding sleeve have been developed to realize the
vertical multi-layer development of low permeability gas res-
ervoirs.
(1) Stratified fracturing with coiled tubing with bottom
packer. This technology integrates the perforation, fracturing
and isolating technologies. First, the coiled tubing tool assem-
bly is run to the 1st fracturing segment and fixed position, the
seating anchorage and packer are set, sanding perforation is
done through the coiled tubing, and fracturing fluid is injected
into the annulus to implement fracturing, meanwhile, base
liquid is pumped at low rate in the tubing. After the 1st-seg-
ment fracturing is done, the coiled tubing packer and coiled
tubing are pulled upward to the 2nd fracturing segment to do
perforation and fracturing again. This technology features not
limited stratified fracturing layers and segments, quick trip-
ping of frac-strings, real time monitoring of bottom hole
pressure with coiled tubing during the fracturing, easy work-
over in later stage, short operation period and high fracturing
efficiency.
(2) Casing cementation sliding sleeve stratified fracturing.
In this technology, the sliding sleeve and casing are connected
and run to the target formation for cementation, then the darts
are dropped to open the sliding sleeve and realize the stratified
 HU Wenrui et al. / Petroleum Exploration and Development, 2018, 45(4): 685–697
fracturing, and the ball seat is formed by the pressure transfer
hole shrinkage of the previous fracturing stage, which avoids
the limit of the conventional stratified fracturing ball seat on
the fracture stages. This fracturing can conduct direct fractur-
ing without perforation first, realizing the integration of frac-
turing and production, and shortening the preparation for
production.
Since 2010, in the Changqing Oilfield, 8 wells have been
treated with this coiled tubing stratified fracturing, with an
average 5.1 layers fractured per well and an average testing
production of 1.52.0 times of the neighboring wells; mean-
while, 74 layers in 15 wells have been fractured by casing
cementation sliding sleeve stratified fracturing, realizing strat-
ified fracturing of 9 layers in one well at most, and the gas
testing result shows that the technology reaches the goal of
producing multi-layers in a well and increasing production.
4.4. Water injection EOR technology
Most low and extra-low permeability oil reservoirs are de-
veloped by water injection to maintain the formation pressure
at present. Since low permeability reservoirs have great seep-
age resistance and strong heterogeneity, it is difficult to sup-
plement the formation energy, and the oil wells have slow
response after water injection, resulting in quick decline of the
production indices such as formation pressure, oil recovery
index, and fluid recovery index. In order to enhance the single
well production and maintain stable production, Changqing
Oilfield has put forward the innovative theory of “advanced
water injection” and developed matching techniques suitable
for water injection in low permeability oil reservoirs.
4.4.1. Water injection technique
The reasons causing difficult energy supplement and un-
balanced water injection in ultra-low permeability oil reser-
voirs include: (1) low reservoir permeability, great fluid
seepage resistance; (2) thick oil layer, strong heterogeneity
vertically, rich interbeds, and great difference in water adsorp-
tion; (3) incompatibility between the injected water and the
lithology, and easy scaling and plugging in the formation; (4)
incompatibility between the injected water and the formation
water, and possible great capillary resistance at the pore throat.
In recent years, based on the high pressure under-injection
mechanism research, core analysis and single layer water in-
jection capacity test, the scale inhibition and dispersing scal-
ing crystals have been developed to effectively reduce the
flow resistance and evenly supply the formation energy, and
the low pressure augmented injection and fine stratified water
injection technologies have been worked out.
(1) Low pressure augmented-injection technology. It is
suitable for low permeability reservoirs with injection diffi-
culty and comprises three modes: overall pressure reduction,
local pressurization and shaped stamping plugging removal.
The overall pressure reduction aims to selecting the injection
agent suitable for the target area, the agent is added at the
 692 
water injection station and then enters the deep formation
along with the injected water to prevent expansion and scaling
and remove scale etc, thus reducing the injecting pressure of
the injection well. The local pressurization aug-
mented-injection is to use the centrifugal pressurized water
injection pump for pressurized water injection; the shaped
stamping plugging removal is to use the impact force created
by the combustion of shaped stamping bullet in the well to
push the liquid in the shaft repeatedly upward, trigger a wide
range of water concussion in the casing, and form the strong
discharge at the oil zone interval, to take the blockage of the
impurity and slurry at the shooting hole and near-well zone
out of the well, moreover the combustion of shaped stamping
bullet is also accompanied with high temperature high pres-
sure jet flow, which acts on the perforation hole and creates
3-5m radial microfracture around the perforation hole, mean-
while the acid fluid can enter the formation more effectively
in a larger range, which could successfully remove the deep
polluting blockage near the well and improves the conductiv-
ity near the shaft, realizing the purpose of reservoir reforma-
tion and low pressure augmented-injection.
(2) Fine stratified water injection technology. It is suitable
for low permeability reservoirs with thick oil layer, rich inter-
beds and strong vertical heterogeneity, it has three stratified
water injection modes: small location, small casing well,
bridge plugging eccentric multi-segment. In the small location
stratified injection, the magnetic positioning test instrument is
run in through the tubing to locate the downhole injection
matching tools to realize accurate injection. This technology is
mature and easy for operation but takes longer time and high
testing cost. The small casing stratified injection is developed
for commingled water injection wells from 114.3 mm (4.5 in)
small casing in ultra-low permeability oil reservoirs. In this
process, the downhole tool string (Y341-95 washable well
packer and seat sliding sleeve etc.) is run in, after the packer is
seated, the seat sliding sleeve is removed when the pressure
reaches 20 MPa to realize the tubing casing separate injection,
and the washable well packer is simple in structure and can be
set reliably. The bridge eccentric multi-segment stratified wa-
ter injection with composite bridge eccentric technology,
matched with unpacking by stage, magnetic positioning and
string anchoring technologies, allows stratified water injection
in large deviation wells, deep wells and small spacing, mean-
while the matching tools have been developed, including the
pressurizing-down gradual unsealing packer, dual-unsealing
gradual unsealing packer and nonmetal hydraulic anchor etc.
4.4.2. Optimization of injection-production well pattern
All the low permeability reservoirs have natural fractures to
different extents, the injected water is likely to dash along the
axial fractures in the sand, “forming fingering”, and causing
imbalance of injection and production horizontally and verti-
cally. Years of practice shows that the rational optimized in-
jection production well pattern can effectively alleviate the
 HU Wenrui et al. / Petroleum Exploration and Development, 2018, 45(4): 685–697
Fig. 6. Schematics of injection-production well pattern
optimization.
imbalance of injection and production.
The diamond inverted 9-spot pattern (Fig. 6a) has good
adaptability and flexibility, enabling the optimum matching of
fracture system and well pattern. The connecting line of injec-
tion well and corner well parallels to the fracture trend in this
well-pattern, meanwhile the well space in the fracture direc-
tion is amplified, which is favorable for increasing fracturing
scale and artificial fracture length, enhancing the single well
production and extending stable production, and alleviating
the waterflooding rate of corner well; meanwhile the short-
ened row space can improve the effect of lateral wells. Till the
late development stage, when the water cut of the corner well
on the fracture line reaches a certain degree, the corner wells
can be converted into water injection wells, and the well pat-
tern is then converted into rectangle 5-spot well pattern (Fig.
6b), which can improve the sweeping volume of matrix pore
to the utmost.
In order to ensure good economic benefit, the rational well
pattern density of low permeability petroleum reservoir
should be controlled between the limit and optimum economic
density. For the oilfields with higher economic risk, the pa-
rameter close to the optimum economic well pattern density
should be adopted. The rational injector producer space can be
determined by considering the reservoir physical property,
fracture development, horizontal and vertical heterogeneity
and economic benefit etc.
4.4.3. Moderate advanced water injection
The water injection in low and extra-low permeability pe-
troleum reservoirs needs longer time to take effect, which is
unfavorable for efficient development. Advanced water injec-
tion is often started long before oilfield development to keep
the formation pressure at a rational level, which can solve the
problem of long taking-effect cycle. If the advanced water
injection time is long enough, the effective displacement
pressure system can be established between the oil well and
water well, which is favorable for increasing the single well
production. But if the water injection pressure is too high, the
formation pressure near the water injection well will quickly
rise, and the resulted stress field variation will likely trigger
the originally closed natural fractures to open and create new
fractures on the weak plane centered around the water well, thus
the injected water would dash along the dynamic fracture belt.
In order to avoid the impacts of these negative factors,
 693 
Changqing Oilfield proposed the small water volume long
term moderate advanced water injection, which has two key
points in the design of water injection intensity: (1) The
maximum injection pressure is less than the fracture open
pressure and formation breakdown pressure, which can effec-
tively prevent the original fracture from opening and new
fractures and stop the water dashing along the fracture. (2)
The minimum injection pressure should effectively overcome
the starting pressure gradient to establish the efficient dis-
placement pressure system and ensure the single well produc-
tion to increase as much as possible. Considering the contra-
diction between the fracture opening, formation breakdown
and starting pressure gradient, this technology can effectively
improve the formation pressure, reduce the pressure sensitiv-
ity effect, prevent the injected water from dashing along the
fracture and maintain the formation pressure balance, which is
favorable for keeping long-term stable and high production.
4.5. Horizontal well development technology
The development of ultra-low permeability oil reservoir
faces more and more complicated reservoir geologic condi-
tions, thus the directional well alone cannot meet the require-
ment of increasing single well production. In 2010, the
Changqing Oilfield made the development strategy of en-
hancing oil layer drilling rate and supplementing energy by
volume fracturing. In light of this, horizontal well testing has
been carried out vigorously and made some major break-
throughs in practical technologies, including horizontal well
pattern optimization and horizontal well fracturing.
4.5.1. Horizontal well pattern optimization
The core of horizontal well pattern optimization is to real-
ize the proper matching between the natural fractures and
artificial fractures and between the fracturing layout and well
pattern under the water injection condition. The dominant
direction of natural fractures in the ultra-low permeability oil
reservoir is the principal seepage direction, due to permeabil-
ity contrast between the principal and lateral seepage direc-
tions, there must exist difference of water-drive seepage pat-
tern on the plane, thus in the optimization of horizontal well
fracture layout, the impact of natural fracture distribution pat-
tern must be considered.
With the horizontal well production as the major index, the
numerical simulation is used to optimize the horizontal well
fracture layout pattern by considering energy supplement,
pressure maintenance level, initial recovery rate, production
decline and well pattern flexibility, to get the well-patterns for
different reservoir conditions: (1) For the reservoir with
thickness about 10 m and few fractures, the 5-spot well pat-
tern is the optimum (Fig. 7a), which can avoid early water
breakthrough and slow down initial production decline. (2)
For the reservoirs more than 16 m thick, with superimposed
oil layers or relatively stable interbeds and few fractures, the
stereoscopic horizontal well pattern is optimum (Fig. 7a),
 HU Wenrui et al. / Petroleum Exploration and Development, 2018, 45(4): 685–697
Fig. 7. Sketch of optimization of horizontal injection-production well pattern.
which can enhance the oil recovery rate. (3) For the reservoirs
about 10 m thick, with rich fractures and high brittleness in-
dex, the long horizontal section volume fracturing well pattern
with quasi-natural energy is optimum (Fig. 7c), which not
only expands the single well control range but also fully uses
the natural energy, avoid the opening of original fractures and
creation of new fractures and prevent the injected water from
dashing along the fractures.
4.5.2. Horizontal well fracturing
Ultra-low permeability gas reservoirs have poor physical
properties, strong horizontal and vertical heterogeneity and
low natural productivity, so oil (gas) wells in these reservoirs
must have volume fracturing to get industrial production. On
the basis of the existing fracturing technology, the Changqing
Oilfield has developed horizontal well volume fracturing
technologies for different types of reservoirs, including hy-
draulic sand-blasting volume fracturing, open-hole packer
volume fracturing, hydraulic pumping bridge plug multi-clus-
ter fracturing etc.
(1) Hydraulic sand-blasting volume fracturing. The tech-
nology uses multiple ejectors to blast the sand simultaneously
and realize the transformation from the single cluster to multi-
cluster perforation. In the process, the sand-carrying passage
changes from the tubing to the annulus, and the injection way
of “large displacement sanding from casing and small dis-
placement fluid supplement from tubing” is adopted. Assisted
with new steel-belt packer and anti-spatter ejector, this tech-
nology can solve the problem of high pressure high displace-
ment fracturing; by enhancing sealing validity of the packer, it
can meet the demand of long time large scale fracturing. The
hydraulic sand-blasting volume fracturing technology has the
advantage of lessening nozzle damage, low cost and easy op-
eration. At present, the fracturing of more than 10 segments
and 2-4 clusters per segment can be finished in one trip.
(2) Open-hole packer volume fracturing. This technology uses
the open-hole packer as carrier. In the process, the fracturing
string is run in when doing completion, and the interval to be
fractured is sealed by setting the packer, then the ball is suc-
 694 
cessively thrown to open the sliding sleeve of different levels
to establish the connecting passage between the tubing and the
upper reservoir, meanwhile the fractured interval is sealed in
order to carry out the segmented fracturing in the horizontal
interval, the well can be put into production after flowback.
The open-hole packer volume fracturing technology can
finish segmented positioned fracturing in one trip. With fewer
downhole tools, simple work procedure, high operation effi-
ciency, low well control risk and reliable string performance,
this technology can be used for the segmented fracturing of
shallow, medium and deep horizontal wells. However, it has
high requirements on trajectory of the horizontal interval, and
thus is complicated in completion procedure and long in op-
eration cycle.
(3) Hydraulic pumping composite bridge plug segmented
multi-cluster fracturing. This technology is based on the in-
troduction of “hydraulic pumping bridge plug segmented
multi-cluster fracturing”. Problems of composite bridge plug
design and material selection, multistage ignition perforation,
safe pumping in of tool string and easy drilling of bridge plug
after fracturing have been overcome through research and
experiment, realizing the localization of this technology. It
adopts the united perforation and bridge plug seating to ac-
complish the perforation and plugging the lower horizon with
one trip string, realizing both segmented fracturing and staged
perforation, meanwhile assisted by temporary material, com-
pleting the multi-cluster fracturing to improve the single seg-
ment fracturing volume. This technology has the advantages
of high sealing reliability, high wellbore quality, and unlimited
number of fracture segments.
Field application results show the composite bridge plug seg-
mented multi-cluster fracturing technology can enhance pro-
duction substantially, with the maximum displacement of 15
m3/min and injected liquid of 2×104 m3 at most, single segment
perforation of 3-6 clusters, fracture band width of 110140 m,
which is 75% wider than that of segmented fracturing.
4.6. CO2-flooding
Water flooding development of low permeability oil reser-
 HU Wenrui et al. / Petroleum Exploration and Development, 2018, 45(4): 685–697
voirs faces problems like low effective displacement pressure,
easy fracture water-out, low swept efficiency, quick produc-
tion decline, and low recovery rate, and now the contradiction
is increasingly prominent. CO2 flooding can greatly make up
the deficiency of water flooding and enhance the oil recovery
rate, thus it is a replacing technology for the effective devel-
opment of low permeability gas reservoirs.
Carbon dioxide is less viscous and easy to enter micro pore
throats. Its oil driving mechanisms[2431] mainly include: (1)
Under the formation temperature and pressure conditions,
CO2 is usually in the supercritical state and has the strong
ability of dissolution and extraction, along with the constant
CO2 dissolving in the oil, the OWC tension drops, the oil vis-
cosity reduces, and the relative permeability of oil phase in-
creases. (2) CO2 dissolves in the formation water to make the
water carbonization and the water viscosity increase to im-
prove the oil water mobility ratio. (3) The carbonated water
resulted from the CO2 dissolution in the formation water re-
acts with the carbonate cement, and then the formation per-
meability improves, leading to the enhancement of injection
capacity, moreover it can contain the clay expansion and sta-
bilize the clay. (4) When the CO2 is injected into the oil res-
ervoir, a small part of gas undissolved in the oil will occupy
the formation pores to displace the oil, meanwhile a great
majority of CO2 dissolves in the oil, making the oil volume
expand and increase the displacement energy, along with the
constant decline of formation pressure during the development,
the CO2 dissolved in the oil will expand and degas, forming
dissolved gas drive to improve the oil displacement efficiency.
Compared with water injection, the pressure of gas injec-
tion is lower, which is good at avoiding the generation of dy-
namic fractures, moreover the CO2 is more easily injected
than water to keep formation pressure and injection-pro-
duction balance, thus the CO2 flooding is better than water
flooding. Field tests and indoor experiments at home and
abroad have demonstrated that the CO2 flooding has big po-
tential to improve recovery of low permeability oil reservoirs
and bright application future.
The matching technologies for CO2 flooding have been
quite mature abroad. Usually reservoirs with good sealing,
weak heterogeneity, good connectivity and fairly complete
injection production well pattern are selected for CO2 flooding.
In China, the low permeability reservoirs have more compli-
cated geologic conditions, and the CO2 flooding for low per-
meability oil reservoirs is still at the initial stage, there are still
many issues in theory and technology needed to be solved on
its way to industrial application, such as miscibility mecha-
nism, storage mechanism, optimization of injection produc-
tion well pattern, CO2 injection technique, anti-channeling and
plugging, and processing of produced fluid etc.
5. Sustainable development prospects and
suggestions
The low permeability oil resources in the primary petrolif-
 695 
erous basins of China account for 60% of the remaining oil
resources, and low permeability natural gas resources account
for 51% of the remaining natural gas resources. Low perme-
ability reserves in the Songliao, Ordos, Qaidam and Junggar
basins all make up more than 85% of their reserves, clearly,
the low permeability resources take an absolute majority in
the remaining oil and gas resources.
With the deepening in geologic cognition, technical pro-
gress, and appraisal improvement, the domain and scope of oil
and gas exploration have been expanding constantly, more
low permeability resources are discovered successively, so the
prospective low permeability resources are increasing. The
abundant low permeability resources in China lay a good
foundation for the future petroleum production growth and
sustainable development, with a great potential in the long
run.
From the producing rate of discovered petroleum reserves,
the producing rate of proved oil reserves is 72%, and most of
the reserves not produced are of low permeability type; the
producing rate of proved natural gas reserves is 38%, and the
reserves not produced are in reservoirs with a permeability of
less than 0.1×103 μm2. From the current development situa-
tion, the effective development of reserves hard to produce
and newly added low permeability reserves is the major chal-
lenge, thus researching, developing and testing pertinent
technologies is the future working orientation[32]. To fulfill the
sustainable development of low permeability oil and gas re-
sources, three aspects of work must be done well:
(1) Technical research: At present, most of the undeveloped
reserves are of low quality, low and ultra-low permeability,
characterized by poor reservoir physical properties, low re-
serve abundance, high exploration cost and great development
difficulty. The effective development of this kind of resource
must depend on technical progress. Therefore, based on the
improvement of low permeability resource development the-
ory, new technologies, new methods and new processes must
be developed, to establish the new profitable development
mode for low quality oil reservoir and confirm the major
technical boundary. For example, the theoretical research of
ultra-low oil gas reservoir seepage mechanism should be
strengthened to find out the main control factors impacting the
development result; the matching technologies for water in-
jection and volume fracturing should be researched further;
the lab research and field test of gas injection and chemical
flooding etc should be carried out to make preparation for the
advance development.
(2) Enterprise management: To realize economic and effec-
tive development of low permeability oil and gas resources,
the “two-low” system, namely “low cost technology + low
cost management” must be adhered to. Under the circum-
stance of low oil price, the enterprises must innovate and im-
prove the low cost technology systems and try low cost man-
agement mode to realize extensive development and good
profit through “constant innovation of technology and man-
 HU Wenrui et al. / Petroleum Exploration and Development, 2018, 45(4): 685–697

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