Invasion of drilling mud into gas-hydrate-bearing sediments. Part II: Effects of geophysical properties of sediments

This study examines the dynamic behaviour of drilling-mud invasion into gas-hydrate-bearing sediment (GHBS) and the effects of such an invasion on wellbore stability and the reliability of well logging. The effects of mud properties on mud invasion into the GHBS are detailed in Part I. Here, we discuss the effects of sediment properties on mud invasion by considering the Chinese first gas-hydrate-drilling expedition in the South China Sea and other hydrate projects. Our simulation results further show that mud-invasion coupling hydrate dissociation and reformation is the main unique characteristic observed during mud invasion in GHBS compared with conventional oil/gas sediments. The appearance of a high-saturation hydrate ring during mud-invasion process is related to not only mud density, temperature and salinity but also sediment properties. On the whole, the effective permeability and initial hydrate saturation plays a critical role in mud invasion in GHBS. The effect of initial hydrate saturation, which corresponds to effective permeability and porosity on the mud invasion in SH7 is pronounced because initial hydrate saturations vary greatly. For pore-filling GHBS without fractures, well-logging results in high-saturation hydrate intervals are more reliable and accurate than those in low-saturation hydrate intervals. The log results at the interbeds with low-saturation hydrates are easily distorted by mud invasion.