Sand production is migration of formation sand induced by the flow of reservoir fluids and it is one of the major challenges facing the oil and gas industry. Excess sand production would cause a series of serious issues, including erosion of downhole and surface equipment, plugging the well, reduction of well productivity, increase of production cost, etc. It is critical to mitigate sand production for economical extraction of oil/gas from the unconsolidated or partially consolidated formations.<br/>The chemical method is one widely evaluated approach to control sand production from the unconsolidated formation, which involves the injection of reactive chemicals, such as liquid resins, into the unconsolidated rock surrounding the well. The cured resin will bond together the sand grains at their point of contact and strengthen the formation. This bonding may impose a negative impact on the well productivity due to the possible seal of pore space with cured resins and hence the reduction in rock permeability. To successfully mitigate sand production using a chemical approach, it is critical to select a chemical material that can provide high compressive strength while leading to minimal permeability reduction.<br/>In this study, a new chemical resin formulation was identified to mitigate sand production from the subterranean formation composed of unconsolidated or weakly consolidated sand. The new formulation allows formation of a porous polymeric network with interconnected pore structures after resin curing. This pore structure within a polymer network helps to overcome the problem of permeability reduction after a typical sand consolidation treatment. The effectiveness of using curable polymeric resin for sand consolidation was confirmed through a compressive strength and permeability study of the consolidated sand packs prepared with this new chemistry.

Porous polymeric resins for sand consolidation

ACS Fall 2021

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