Can kinematic approaches be used to predict shear fracture orientations for use in discrete fracture network models?
Structural geologists typically invoke the Mohr-Coulomb failure criterion to explain the orientations of shear fractures. Nevertheless, there have been recent attempts to explain shear fracture orientation in terms of finite strain or strain increment. In these models, spatial variations in shear fracture orientation are explained by spatial variations in the orientations of lines of no…
Read MoreEvaluation of a discrete fracture network model from fractured outcrop analogues
We describe a procedure which links multiple scale fracture observations to 3-D Discrete Fracture Network (DFN) model simulations. The rationale of the study is to construct realistic DFN models using input data collected at specific scales of analysis; the resultant DFN model is used to predict fracture geometries at intermediate scales, and these predictions are…
Read MoreNumerical Modelling Of Natural Fracture Propagation In Shale-Dominated Sequences
Fracture Characterisation in Crystalline Basement: Building an Analogue for the Clair Basement Based on the Lewisian Gneiss Complex of NW Scotland
Dissolution of CO2 From Leaking Fractures in Saline Formations
Dissolution of CO2 From Leaking Fractures in Saline Formations
Studies of fracture network geometry of reservoir outcrop analogues from terrestrial lidar data: attempts to quantify spatial variations of fracture characteristics
We describe studies analysing terrestrial lidar datasets of fracture systems from a range of reservoir analogues in clastic and carbonate lithologies that represent geological analogues of offshore hydrocarbon reservoirs for the UK continental shelf. As fracture networks (observed here from centimetre to kilometre scale) can significantly affect the permeability of a fractured reservoir, the definition…
Read MoreMulti-scale characterization of the seismogenic Gole Larghe Fault Zone (Southern Alps, Italy): methodology and results
The Gole Larghe Fault Zone (GLFZ) in the Italian Southern Alps is characterized by the occurrence of cataclasites and pseudotachylytes (solidified frictional melts) formed along pre-existing magmatic cooling joints over a fault zone width of ca. 500 m, under ambient conditions of 9-11 km depth and 250-300C (the base of the seismogenic zone in the…
Read MoreCharacterising fracture systems within the Lewisian Gneiss Complex, northwest Scotland: An onshore analogue for the Clair Field.
The Clair Field lies in the Faroe-Shetland Basin, with reservoirs in Devonian and Carboniferous sediments overlying and onlapping a basement high that was upfaulted in the Mesozoic. At Clair, the basement is considered an important control on fluid flow and structural development of the field due to its highly fractured nature. Consequently, it is important…
Read MoreCharacterising fracture systems within fractured crystalline reservoirs: the Lewisian Gneiss Complex, Scotland as an onshore analogue for the Clair Field basement
Exotic hydrocarbon reservoirs, such as crystalline basement, are increasingly a target for hydrocarbon exploration in the development of new and existing fields. The Clair field lies in the Faroe-Shetland Basin, with reservoirs in Devonian- Carboniferous clastics overlying and onlapping a basement high that was upfaulted in the Mesozoic. This basement is known to control fluid…
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