Method for predicting occurrence of microquartz in a basin
AssigneeExxonMobil Upstream Research Company
InventorsHubert E. King, Jr., Stephen D. Cameron, Marsha W. French
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A method, including: obtaining a grain size for amorphous silica associated with a basin and a grain size for quartz associated with the basin; obtaining kinetics of silica dissolution corresponding to the basin and quartz precipitation corresponding to the basin; determining, with a processor, a concentration of amorphous silica in water based on the grain size for amorphous silica, the grain size for quartz, and the kinetics of silica dissolution and quartz precipitation; comparing, with the processor, the concentration of amorphous silica in water to an amorphous silica saturation condition; and determining, with the processor, a presence of microquartz based on a result of the comparing.
Claims17
A method, comprising:
- obtaining a grain size for amorphous silica associated with a basin and a grain size for quartz associated with the basin;
- obtaining kinetics of silica dissolution corresponding to the basin and quartz precipitation corresponding to the basin;
- determining, with a processor, a concentration of amorphous silica in water based on the grain size for amorphous silica, the grain size for quartz, and the kinetics of silica dissolution and quartz precipitation;
- comparing, with the processor, the concentration of amorphous silica in water to an amorphous silica saturation condition;
- determining, with the processor, a presence of microquartz based on a result of the comparing;
- and
- generating a model for the basin, where the model assigns a probability of the presence of microquartz in a particular zone of the basin based on the determined presence of microquartz.
A method, comprising:
- obtaining a grain size for silica associated with a basin and a grain size for quartz associated with the basin;
- obtaining kinetics of silica dissolution corresponding to the basin and quartz precipitation corresponding to the basin;
- determining, with a processor, a concentration of silica in water based on the grain size for silica, the grain size for quartz, and kinetics of silica dissolution and quartz precipitation;
- determining, with the processor, a presence of microquartz based on the concentration of silica in water;
- and
- identifying zones in the basin having high reservoir quality based on the presence of microquartz.
A method, comprising:
- obtaining, for a basin with zones that have each undergone a different thermal history, a corresponding plurality of burial rates;
- determining, with a processor, a relative likelihood that each of the zones includes microquartz based on the corresponding plurality of burial rates;
- determining a reservoir quality potential of one or more zones of the basin;
- and
- updating a basin model with the reservoir quality potential for the one or more zones.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.