Experimental study on dynamic pore-fracture evolution and multiphase flow in oil-saturated coal considering the influence of in-situ stress

Abstract

The methane drainage in liquid-saturated coal is directly related to the multiphase flow in complex geological structures. In this study, the pore-fracture dynamic evolution induced by in-situ stress and the corresponding gas-liquid migration and morphology characteristics were investigated by a self-developed online LF-NMR triaxial stress system. The dynamic variation, obvious change, and slight response were occurred at the migration pore (MP＞3ms), percolation pore (0.3ms < PP < 3ms), and adsorption pore (AP<0.3ms) with the increased stress, and development of gas channel was contributed by MP (15%–20%), AP (5%–10%), and PP(0–5%) responding to the gas flooding. The pore-fracture successively experienced compression, dilation, expansion, and coalescence, and PP and MP dominated the fracture initialization and connection. The permeability is negatively correlated with the fractal dimension of the pore-fracture structure and is exponentially related to the porosity and MP porosity. The longitudinal shear fracture is beneficial for the gas-liquid migration, and the horizontal tension crack connects the scattered pore and branch fracture. The gas channel was influenced by the liquid capillary pressure and gas jiamin effect in poor pore-fracture and mainly influenced by the gas slippage effect, immiscible behavior, and fracture surface tension force in mature pore-fracture. The optimal gas channel occurred at the crack-propagation period, which was located at around 70% peak strength with 1.5md permeability, high liquid relative permeability and lower gas relative permeability. The findings provide significant insight into methane extraction.