Abstract
Coal seam gas (CSG) is an unconventional energy resource, whereby production is mainly controlled by the underlying fracture networks, known as “cleats”. The natural cleats are generally mineralized during diagenesis, which significantly reduces fracture conductivity because of the more tortuous flow pathways and smaller cross-sectional area perpendicular to the flow. This work aims at characterizing the mineral fillings of the coal cleat network by utilizing X-ray microcomputed tomography (micro-CT) imaging to investigate the effect of minerals on the petrophysical properties of coal. We apply a high-resolution micro-CT to obtain a 3D digital representation of a mineralized coal sample collected from Moura mine of Bowen Basin. The main components of the coal sample, including coal matrix, cleats, and minerals, are individually analyzed to give the statistics of cleat orientation, length, and thickness using quantitative image analysis. According to the measured statistical data, digital coal models with ...
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