Efficient design of water based drilling fluids (WBMs) with environmental and economical advantages and good performance for shale formations of Argentina: study of new polymeric additives

MARIA CELESTE IGLESIAS; MARÍA SOLEDAD PERESÍN; CASIS, NATALIA; DIANA ALEJANDRA ESTENOZ; VILLADA, YURANY; ELEONORA ERDMANN

Buenos Aires

Congreso; Argentina shale production 2018, new technologies and completions optimizations; 2018

Drilling fluids are used in the operation of hydrocarbon exploitation. The design and composition of such fluids are determined by the geological characteristics of the formations and the additives available in the location. Fluids must also meet requirements physicochemical, economical and environmental. Density, filtration control, pH, rheological behavior and chemical composition of drilling fluids must contribute to fulfill different functions that include cleaning of well, keeping of cuttings suspended, preventing the cavitation, forming an impermeable cake near the borehole, cooling and lubricating tools, promoting hydraulic power, and being compatible with logging tools. There are two main kinds of drilling fluids: water based muds (WBM) and oil based muds (OBM). The OBMs are characterized by their high performance in unconventional reservoirs due to the very low interaction with the reactive formation. Their environmental impact promotes the design of WBMs that present low toxicity.In this work we studied: i) the design of WBMs with rheological properties similar to the OBMs used in Argentine shale formations; ii) the effect of the concentration of xanthan gum (XGD) and polyanionic cellulose (PAC) on the rheological and filtration properties; iii) evaluation of use of cellulose nanofibrils (CNF) as replacement of XGD in WBMs for Argentina shale; and iv) determination of the viscoelastic properties of WBMs.