LAUSR

Abstract Compared with the marine shale payzones, lacustrine shale payzones generally contain more interbed layers (e.g., sandstone interbeds and carbonate interbeds), bringing about a higher complexity to the identification of effective lacustrine shale payzones. In this work, a pragmatic but systematic approach is developed to identify the effective lacustrine shale payzones with commercial hydrocarbon-production potentials. Such identification approach is developed based on three easily accessible data sources that are obtained from multiple wells drilled in a given region: 1) well logging data; 2) measured properties of the core samples; and 3) production test data. In this approach, the first step is to identify shale-containing formations based on the lithology profile along a well that has been interpreted using the well logging data. Secondly, a shale-dominated formation is extracted from a given shale-containing formation if the ratio of total shale thickness to the total formation thickness exceeds 60%; this cut-off value is selected based on the consideration that such formation has a higher possibility of industrial production potential. Lastly, a shale-dominated formation can be classified as an effective shale payzone if the total organic carbon (TOC) content, porosity, and effective thickness are all greater than the given threshold values. By using this proposed method, one can obtain the total effective thickness and the regional distribution of effective lacustrine shale payzones, which could help to locate the sweet spot of the shale payzones as well as subsequently design proper methods for recovering the shale resources. The Lower Jurassic formations possess abundant lacustrine shale layers that are widely considered to be the potential lacustrine shale gas payzones in the northwest of Sichuan Basin in China. A case study in this formation is presented to demonstrate the efficacy of the newly developed approach in identifying the effective lacustrine shale payzones. Validation results prove that this new method can be used to effectively identify the effective lacustrine shale payzones with commercial production potentials.