Improved Methods for Determination of Petrophysical Properties of Unconventional Tight Rocks Using Particulate Samples

Abstract

Drill cuttings are available continuously over the entire depth of any drilled wells. The use of drill cuttings to obtain petrophysical data can add a significant value in formation evaluation. An update to the previous study is presented using NMR and Archimedes principle to determine petrophysical properties including porosity, bulk density, and matrix density from drill cuttings of organic-rich mudrock formations. In the original published method, sonication was used to clean and saturate the drill cutting samples. In this improved method, particulate samples were saturated using both sonication and pressure injection methods. The obtained results were compared with accepted lab measurement techniques. Results show that pressure saturation of particulate samples can provide accurate results of petrophysical properties. Obtaining reliable petrophysical data from drill cuttings can provide continuous and quasi-real-time data for the formation evaluation of reservoirs and can effectively reduce costs by reducing or eliminating expensive formation evaluation methods.