Modeling Time-Dependent Pore Pressure Due to Capillary and Chemical Potential Effects and Resulting Wellbore Stability in Shales

Abstract

During drilling operations, the mud filtrate interacts with the pore fluid around the wellbore and changes pore pressure by capillary and chemical potential effects. Thus the change in pore pressure around borehole becomes time-dependent, particularly in extremely low permeability shaley formations. In this paper, the change in pore pressure due to capillary and chemical potential effects are investigated experimentally. Analytical models are also developed based on the experimental results. A wellbore stability analysis model incorporating the time-dependent change in pore pressure is applied to a vertical well in a shale formation under normal fault stress regime.