Abstract
Is shale gas feasible in lacustrine basins?
Shale gas has become an increasingly more important source of natural gas in the United States over the past decades. Less attention given to shale gas in lacustrine basins and the few cases are not encouraging.
Abu Gabra formation act as the main effective source rock and reservoir in the same time gross thickness reach to about 7000m at the depocenter and characterized by the interbedded sands which producing condensate, light oil and recently considerable volumes of associated and dry gas.
Geochemical evaluation carried to evaluate the source rock, pyrolysis analysis results of 617 geochemical rock samples from Azraq wells and 337 geochemical rock samples from Neem wells, used to evaluate the richness of source rock (TOC), kerogen type (HI, S2) and thermal maturity (Tmax). VRo readings of 119 rock samples from Azraq wells and 73 geochemical rock samples from Neem wells used to measure the thermal maturity. 1D modeling done to predict the geothermal history and heat flow of the study area. The geomechanical characteristics of the source rock (brittleness) evaluated using the mineral and metal analysis result of 3 core samples from selected wells.
Based on the main key parameters used to evaluate shale gas in Marine basins there is high feasibility of shale gas in Lacustrine basin, where the average TOC in the study area (2.0 wt% - 3.0 wt%), VRo (0.48 C"" 1.0 to penetrated intervals) high heat flow (peak in tertiary 83 mw/m2).
High challenge of; litho-facies variation within short distance (difficulty of detecting sweet spot), suppression of thermal maturity, technological challenge of fracturing tools stands there to answer whether it will be success and economical viable?..
