Bi-Directional Interactions between Fluids and Geomechanics in Fractured Reservoirs

Popular ideas used to explain geomechanical-fluid interactions in fractured reservoirs are inadequate, or wrong, as they are based on assumptions that are incorrect. Poro-elasticity considerations show that predicted aperture effects are highly sensitive to the local boundary conditions, which themselves may change during reservoir operation. The more-general approach is to consider fully-coupled systems of matrix blocks bounded by fractures, and the porefluids. Simulations based on such systems reveal significant insights, as well as surprising outcomes, with effective permeabilities that can vary by more than 1000x due to small changes in conditions. Application of these concepts within reservoir models can be used to improve the results of reservoir flow simulation.