RELATIONSHIP OF

RESERVOIR PROPERTIES
WITH MINERALOGY AND
EFFECTIVE POROSITY
FOR SHALY SANDSTONES

Tao Wu1 and Robert R. Berg1

Presented by: Ramsha Rauf

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CONTENTS
 Introduction
 Background
 Estimation of Effective Porosity
1. Clay content and morphology
2. Morphology of clay minerals
3. Dissolution porosity
4. Effective porosity from mineralogy analysis
5. Effective porosity from capillary pressure analysis
 Estimation of permeability
1. Kozeny-Carman model
2. Regression model
3. Model based on pore throat size
 Estimation of capillary displacement pressure
 Discussions
 Conclusions

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INTRODUCTION
 Shaly sandstones have long been a problem
for interpretation of reservoir properties.
The presence of clays has two effects on the
reservoir:
1. Reducing a reservoir’s storage capacity by
reducing effective porosity, and
2. Reducing a reservoir’s productivity by
reducing permeability

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BACKGROUND
 Porosity is measured by gas expansion
method.
 Permeability is a function of the abundance
of intergranular macroporosity
 Most widely used term is Effective porosity

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EFFECTIVE POROSITY
 The interconnected pore volume or void space in a
rock that contributes to fluid flow or permeability
in a reservoir.
 It can be expressed as
øe = øt (1— Swir )
 Øe is effective porosity
 Øt is total porosity
 Swir is irreducible water saturation which
includes both clay bound and capillary bound
water
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ESTIMATION OF EFFECTIVE
POROSITY:
 Clay content and morphology
 Microporosity of clay minerals
 Dissolution porosity
 Effective porosity from mineralogy analysis

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CLAY CONTENT AND
MORPHOLOGY
 If a sandstone contains considerable clay minerals, it is
called shaly sandstone
 Exceptionally few hydrocarbon-bearing clastic reservoir
rocks are essentially free of clay minerals
 Porosity and permeability continually decrease as clay
progressively fills in the pore space of clean sandstone until
all the pore space is filled with clay particles. As clay
content continually increases, sand grains will be suspended
in clay particles. Porosity and permeability then start to
increase with clay content. The inflection point is the
boundary between clayey sand domain and sandy shale
domain. The boundary is located around 40% volumetric
clay content. In this study, 5% and 40% clay content as the
two boundaries for shaly sandstone are used. Lower than 5%
is clean sandstone, and higher than 40% is sandy shale.

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CLAY CONTENT AND
MORPHOLOGY(CONT..)
 Clay content usually shows an inverse
relationship with permeability and this
relation has been used for permeability
prediction but this is not quite accurate
because for instance, at constant 10% clay
volume, permeability changes three orders of
magnitude.

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POROSITY PERMEABILITY CROSS
PLOT
 Authigenic clays are divided into three
morphologic groups and defined regions on a
porosity-permeability cross-plot. Groups of
pore-bridging, pore-lining and discrete
particles of clay are commonly associated
with illite, chlorite and smectite, and
kaolinite, respectively.

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 POROSITY AND PERMEABILITY
CROSS PLOT
 . The pore-bridging clays reduce the porosity slightly but can
greatly reduce sandstone permeability, while the discrete
particle clays lower porosity and permeability only slightly. There
is no general relationship between porosity and permeability for
all samples, although a relationship exists within each individual
group (with the exception of pore-bridging clay).

a b 10
MICROPOROSITY OF CLAY
MINERALS
 For shaly sandstone, the major problem is
clay micropores, which have been
characterized as pores with pore- aperture
radii of less than 0.5 µm or defined as the
pores associated with clay minerals
 20%, 70%, and 90% are proposed as the
average microporosity for diagenetic
kaolinite, chlorite, and illite respectively

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MICROPOROSITY OF CLAY
MINERALS(CONT…)
 The data to estimate effective porosity
consists of a set of 14 samples, which were
drawn deliberately from a larger sample
population of 44 petroleum reservoir
sandstones. These samples cover a porosity
and air permeability range of 8.5-to-26.5%
and 0.031-to-1173 md, respectively.
Effective porosities are calculated with
equation
øe = øt — øcl

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MICROPOROSITY OF CLAY
MINERALS(CONT..)
TABLE 2 Measured petrophysical data and calculated
effective porosity.
Sample Effective
Formation Permeability Porosity MPD* Clay Qv* Pdma* Porosity Name (md) (%)
“Discrete Particle” Clays
Berea 796 21.2 170 25.7 5 0.03 6.5 20.2
Miocene “S” 1173 22.9 145 31 5 0.03 6. 21.9
Paluxy 1037 24.8 110 23.8 5 0.02 7.8 23.8
Cotton Valley 150 14.1 166 21.2 6 0.06 6.8 12.9
Tar Springs 420 19 146 19.2 3 0.03 8.2 18.4

“Pore-Lining” Clays
Tusculoosa 41 25.7 180 10.9 15 0.11 8.8 15.2
Vicksburg 7 18.3 253 5.6 11 0.14 14.5 10.6
Hosston 0.82 10.9 235 2.2 7 0.13 50 6
Wilcox 1.4 13.2 245 3.5 10 0.37 20.5 6.2
Frio 58 26.5 88 8 12 0.36 17.1 18.1

“Pore-Bridging” Clays
Vicksburg 0.09 19.1 162 0.54 20 0.15 47 1.1
**
Hosston 0.15 8.45 253 1.34 10 0.2 92
Wilcox 0.031 11.1 113 0.42 10 0.54 122 2.1
Wilcox 0.21 12.9 71 1.47 10 0.36 70 3.9

Source: Neasham, 1977, effective porosity values are calculated with equation (2).
* d: median grain diameter (µm); MPD: median pore throat diameter (µm); Qv:
cation exchange capacity per unit pore volume ( meq/ml); Pdma: air-mercury
displacement pressure (psi)
** a negative value is obtained. This may be caused by the measurement of

porosity and clay content.

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DISSOLUTION POROSITY
 Dissolution pores are the pores that result from
removal of carbonates, feldspar, sulfate, or
other soluble materials.
 At high porosities, the pores are predominately
macropores, and at low porosities, the pores are
predominately micropores
 A general equation for effective porosity can be
written as
 øe = øt — øcl — ød
 where ød is the dissolution porosity.

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EFFECTIVE POROSITY FROM
MINERALOGY ANALYSIS
 If several clay minerals exist in a shaly
sandstone, then the equation for effective
porosity can be written as
øe = øt — ΣVclj ømj — ød
Where
ø cl = ΣVclj ømj
Vclj is the volume of clay mineral j, ømj is the
average micro- porosity of 100% clay mineral j;
and ød is the dissolution porosity.

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 EFFECTIVE POROSITY AND
MINEROLOGY ANALYSIS(CONT..)
 Relative volume content of each clay mineral
can be obtained from X-ray diffraction
analysis
Detrital
Detrital composition
composition (%)
(%) X-ray
X-ray defraction
defraction (wt
(wt %)
%)
Depth
Depth dd Qz
Qz FSP
FSP R F
RF Clay
Clay Cement
Cement kk øøtt Kaolinite
Kaolinite Illite
Illite Verm+Ch+
Verm+Ch+ øøee
Well
Well (ft)
(ft) (mm)
(mm) (md)
(md) (%)
(%) Mon
Mon (%)
(%)
T54-4
T54-4 11459.3
11459.3 0.24
0.24 39
39 44
44 11
11 66 138
138 16.8
16.8 75
75 99 16
16 13.13
13.13
11467.2
11467.2 0.25
0.25 46
46 34
34 11 14
14 55 74
74 19.2
19.2 80
80 11
11 99 14.79
14.79
11506.5
11506.5 0.48
0.48 52
52 34
34 33 66 55 90
90 19
19 69
69 13
13 18
18 16.77
16.77
11525.8
11525.8 0.42
0.42 47
47 39
39 66 55 33 53
53 18.7
18.7 68
68 14
14 18
18 16.81
16.81
11567.5
11567.5 0.31
0.31 49
49 33
33 33 11
11 44 191
191 21
21 78
78 33 19
19 17.62
17.62
11588.1
11588.1 0.37
0.37 48
48 38
38 22 88 44 108
108 19.4
19.4 77
77 10
10 13
13 16.79
16.79
11601.5
11601.5 0.33
0.33 51
51 35
35 44 99 11 37
37 16.9
16.9 77
77 11
11 12
12 13.94
13.94
11626.5
11626.5 0.22
0.22 46
46 38
38 33 55 88 1.5
1.5 15.3
15.3 35
35 19
19 46
46 12.54
12.54
T27x-34
T27x-34 12263.5
12263.5 0.29
0.29 46
46 41
41 44 55 44 25
25 17
17 40
40 26
26 34
34 14.29
14.29
12284.5
12284.5 0.33
0.33 42
42 41
41 66 77 55 42
42 17.5
17.5 61
61 17
17 22
22 14.57
14.57
12286.5
12286.5 0.37
0.37 44
44 42
42 66 55 33 66 15.7
15.7 34
34 42
42 24
24 12.68
12.68
12317.5
12317.5 0.39
0.39 40
40 43
43 88 66 22 152
152 17.8
17.8 77
77 10
10 13
13 15.84
15.84
T55X-34
T55X-34 12981.5
12981.5 0.23
0.23 68
68 13
13 33 13
13 22 0.8
0.8 11.5
11.5 38
38 31
31 31
31 4.2
4.2
13004.5
13004.5 0.45
0.45 70
70 17
17 22 66 44 3.9
3.9 13
13 78
78 55 17
17 11.13
11.13
13116.5
13116.5 0.47
0.47 62
62 25
25 22 66 44 5.4
5.4 13.8
13.8 82
82 10
10 88 11.98
11.98

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EFFECTIVE POROSITY FROM
CAPILLARY PRESSURE ANALYSIS
 Pore size distribution is usually obtained
from mercury injection capillary pressure
curves and can be used to differentiate
effective and non effective porosity.

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ESTIMATION OF PERMEABILITY
 Kozeny-Carman model
 Regression models
 Models based on pore-throat size

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KOZENY-CARMAN MODEL
 The permeability is expressed as
K=1013øR /fı2

Where
where k is permeability in md, 1013 is a unit
convertion factor (1µm2 = 1013md), ø is porosity as
a fraction, ı is tortuosity, which usually varies
between 2–4 in clean sandstones, and f is the
shape factor, equal to 2 for circular tubes and
equal to 3 for cracks and the combined factor, fı,
is called Kozeny constant, Kz.
but it is often invalid for consolidated sandstone
and shaly sandstone
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KOZNEY-CARMAN MODEL

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REGRESSION MODEL
 Following equation is used
 lnk =—1.299 +1.189 lnd + 1.049(ln ø )
e 2

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MODELS BASED ON PORE-
THROAT SIZE
 Pore-throat controls the transport properties
of porous media
 Estimation of characteristic/critical pore
throat size is a more effective permeability
predictor than grain size or surface area

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ESTIMATION OF CAPILLARY
DISPLACEMENT PRESSURE
 Capillary pressure has been widely used to
evaluate sealing capacity, pay versus non pay, and
height of transition zone.
 Of the variables obtained from capillary pressure
measurement, displacement pressure, Pdma (air-
mercury) is defined as “that pressure required to
form a continuous filament of non-wetting fluid
through the largest connected pore throats of the
rock.”
 Models are proposed to estimate capillary
displacement pressure or pore-throat size from
permeability and/or porosity but they only work
for clear sandstone
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ESTIMATION OF CAPILLARY
DISPLACEMENT PRESSURE(CONT..)

 where Pdma is air mercury displacement

pressure

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DISCUSSION
 Clay minerals have a significant influence on
transport properties of petroleum reservoir
rocks.
1. effect on porosity
2. effect on pore geometries
3. effect on tortuosity
4. effect on pore orientation and anisotropy.

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DISCUSSION
 Permeability is directly controlled by pore
throat diameter. The rest of the factors like
grainsize and sorting, specific surface area,
and clay content, affect permeability
indirectly by modifying pore-throat size.

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 DISCUSSION

aa b

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CONCLUSIONS
 The effective porosity can be estimated by
subtracting noneffective porosity from total
porosity.
 The effective porosity can also be obtained
from capillary pressure measurement.
 The effective porosity is strongly correlated
with permeability, capillary pressure and
pore-throat diameter.

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 ANY
QUESTIONS?
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THANK YOU

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