Porosity (Ø)
The porosity can be defined as follows:
x The fluid-storage capacity of a porous medium, which means the part of the
rock’s total volume that is not occupied by solid particles.
x A measure of the pore space available for the storage of fluids in rock.
Genetically, the following types of porosity can be distinguished:
x Intergranular porosity
x Vugular porosity
x Fracture porosity
x Micro porosity
Rock media having both fracture and intergranular pores are called double-
porous or fracture-porous media.
Intergranular porosity
Intergranular porosity is the most common kind of porosity. Intergranular porosity
is the open space between the grains or fragments of clastic rocks such as sandstones,
conglomerates and clastic limestones.
When identical spheres are stacked as in Figure 3, the porosity is around 48%,
regardless of the size of the spheres. Of course, nature would not stack the grains so
neatly directly on top of one another, nor would they all be identical. The 48% is
therefore a theoretical maximum.
Figure 3 Stacked, Same-size Spheres
7
It is not unusual, however, to encounter sandstones with porosity as high as 25%.
This requires that the sand grains be relatively well sorted (close to the same size)
and fairly well rounded (not angular). These are characteristics of beach-type
deposits. Only a few sand grains appear to touch in Figure 4, suggesting the grains
are not packed closely together. However, this cross-sectional view shows only a
single plane, so many hidden contact points exist on either side of that plane.
Figure 4 Sandstone with Rounded, Well-sorted Grains
The average grain size is another important characteristic of clastic reservoirs but
does not directly affect porosity. That is, the grains shown in Figure 5 could be large
or small, but the porosity would remain the same.
The degree of grain-size sorting, however, has a profound effect on porosity. Figure
5 shows similar large grains as were present in Figure 4, but with smaller grains
added between them, plugging up the pore spaces. This obviously can drastically
reduce porosity.
Figure 5 Poor Sorting Can Sharply Reduce Porosity
8
Vugular porosity
The second significant porosity type is vugular porosity. This occurs in limestones
that after lithification were lifted up above ocean level and exposed to fresh surface
waters. Acidic ground water percolates down through the limestone, dissolving
networks of tiny, interconnected channels, or vugs.
The vugs are normally quite narrow, occupying very little space, so vugular porosity
is typically quite low. Nevertheless, some of the largest and most prolific reservoirs
in the world are in vugular limestone. Although the porosity may be less than 5%, it
can be compensated for by a thicker formation.
Fracture porosity
The third porosity type is fracture porosity. Fractures occur when hard, competent
rock formations are subjected to wrenching tectonic stresses. Porosity exists when
the rock remains in stress, maintaining the fractures’ offset; that is, not allowing the
fracture to heal.
Fracture porosity typically is even lower than vugular porosity. It rarely can be
commercial by itself, but often enhances intergranular or vugular porosity. In this
situation, the fracture porosity is called secondary porosity while the intergranular
or vugular porosity is the primary porosity.
Micro porosity
In solids (i.e. excluding aggregated materials such as soils), the term 'micro porosity'
refers to pores smaller than 2 nm in diameter.
9
Absolute and Effective Porosity
As the sediments were deposited and the rock were being formed during past
geological times, some void space that developed became isolated from the other
void space by excessive cementation. Thus, many of the void space are
interconnected while some of the pore spaces are completely isolated. This leads to
two distinct types of porosity, namely:
x Absolute porosity
x Effective porosity
Absolute porosity (Øa)
The absolute porosity is defined as the ratio of the total pore space in the rock to that
of the bulk volume.
A rock may have considerable absolute porosity and yet have low conductivity to
fluid for lack of pore interconnection. The absolute porosity is generally expressed
mathematically by the following relationship:
ܶ݁݉ݑ݈ݒ ݁ݎ ݈ܽݐ
Ø =
ܾ݁݉ݑ݈ݒ ݈݇ݑ
ܾ ݁݉ݑ݈ݒ ݈݇ݑെ ݃݁݉ݑ݈ݒ ݊݅ܽݎ
Ø =
ܾ݁݉ݑ݈ݒ ݈݇ݑ
ܸ െ ܸீ ܸ
Ø = =
ܸ ܸ
where:
Øa : Absolute porosity.
Vb : Bulk volume (L3)
Vp : Pore volume (L3)
VG : Grain volume (L3)
10
Effective porosity (Ø)
The effective porosity is the percentage of interconnected pore-space with respect
to the bulk volume as expressed below:
݁݉ݑ݈ݒ ݁ݎ ݀݁ݐܿ݁݊݊ܿݎ݁ݐ݊ܫ
Ø =
ܾ݁݉ݑ݈ݒ ݈݇ݑ
where:
Ø : Effective porosity.
The effective porosity is the value that is used in all reservoir engineering
calculations because it represents the interconnected pore space that contains the
recoverable hydrocarbon fluids.
Note that:
Ø = Ø + Ø
where:
Ør : Residual porosity.
݁݉ݑ݈ݒ ݁ݎ ݀݁ݐ݈ܽݏܫ
Ø =
ܾ݁݉ݑ݈ݒ ݈݇ݑ
11
Models of Porous Media
The geometric character of rock’s permeable pore space is in reality quite
complicated, and may very greatly from one rock type to another. In practice, it is
impossible to counter the pore-system geometry in a detailed and faithful way.
Therefore, several idealized models have been developed to approximate porous
rock media and their varied characteristics.
1. Idealized Porous Medium Represented by Parallel Cylindrical Pores
ܸ (ߨ ݎଶ )(݊)(݉) ߨ
Ø = = = = 0.785 ݎ78.5%
ܸ (2 ()݊ ݎ2 )݉ ݎ 4
where:
r : The pipe radius
n and m : the number of cylinders contained in the bulk volume.
Note that it is obvious that rocks don’t have pores like this and that this model gives
an unrealistically high porosity value.
12
This model may through, be used in some situations where fluid flow under
simplified conditions is modelled.
2. Idealized Porous Medium Represented by Regular Cubic-Packed
Spheres
4
ܸ (4)ݎଷ െ 8 כቀ ߨ ݎଷ ቁ ߨ
Ø = = 3 = 1 െ = 0.476 ݎ47.6%
ܸ (4)ݎଷ 6
3. Idealized Porous Medium Represented by Regular Rhombohedral-
Packed Spheres
13
4 4
ܸ െܸ ܸ ቀ3 ߨ ݎଷ ቁ ቀ3 ߨ ݎଷ ቁ
Ø = = 1െ =1െ = 1െ
ܸ ܸ ()݄ ܣ ൫2 ݎ2 ݎξ2 ݎ൯
ଷ
(ߨ ) ݎ
= 1െ = 0.26 ݎ26%
(3 ξ2 ݎଷ )
4. Idealized Porous Medium Represented by Irregular-Packed Spheres
with different radii
Some real values of measured porosities:
1) Sandstone: 10% - 40%; depending upon the nature of cement and their
nature of consolidation.
2) Limestone and Dolomite: 5%-25%.
3) Clays: 20%-45% depends upon origin and depth.
It is generally said that the porosity is:
A. Negligible if Ø < 5%
B. Low if 5%< Ø < 10%
C. Good if 10%< Ø < 20%
D. Very good if Ø > 20%
14
Averaging of Porosity
The porosity data that are measured as part of the routine core analysis are obtained
from core plug samples that actually represent a very small fraction of the entire
reservoir rock. Therefore, properties that are measured as part of the routine core
analysis must be averaged and scaled up from the core scale to the reservoir scale
for use in reservoir engineering and reservoir simulation. This is accomplished by
employing different types of averaging methods. If the reservoir rock shows large
variations in porosity vertically but has fairly uniform porosity parallel to the
bedding planes, the arithmetic average porosity or the thickness-weighted average
porosity is used to describe the average reservoir porosity. For stratified core
sections, the thickness weighted averaging is used to obtain the average porosity.
Due to the changes in sedimentation or depositional conditions, significant
variations in porosity can be observed in different sections of the reservoir. In such
cases, the areal-weighted or the volume-weighted average porosity is employed to
describe the average reservoir rock porosity. The mathematical equations used for
averaging the porosity data have the following forms:
x Arithmetic average,
σୀଵ
ഥ=
݊
x Thickness-weighted average,
σୀଵ ݄
ഥ=
σୀଵ ݄
x Areal-weighted average,
σୀଵ ܣ
ഥ=
σୀଵ ܣ
x Volumetric-weighted average,
σୀଵ ܣ ݄
ഥ=
σୀଵ ܣ ݄
where
n is the total number of core samples
hi is the thickness of core sample i or reservoir area i
15
ࢥi is the porosity of core sample i or reservoir area i
Ai is the reservoir area i
Example (1)
Calculate the arithmetic average and thickness-weighted average from the following
measurements:
Sample Thickness, ft Porosity, %
1 1 10
2 1.5 12
3 1 11
4 2 13
5 2.1 14
6 1.1 10
Solution:
x Arithmetic average,
σୀଵ
ഥ=
݊
(10 + 12 + 11 + 13 + 14 + 10)
ഥ=
= 11.67%
6
x Thickness-weighted average,
σୀଵ ݄
ഥ=
σୀଵ ݄
(10 כ1 + 12 כ1.5 + 11 כ1 + 13 כ2 + 14 כ2.1 + 10 כ1.1)
ഥ=
= 12.11%
(1 + 1.5 + 1 + 2 + 2.1 + 1.1)
16
Porosity Determination
The determination of rock porosity can be accomplished via two approaches:
(1) Direct measurement through experiments in laboratory.
(2) Indirect measurement based on a variety of logging methods.
Of the two methods, the indirect measurement is usually subjected to so many
influencing factors that great error is produced during its usage. In contrast, the
former one, the method on the basis of laboratory measurements, is able to
accomplish the determination of porosity more accurately through routine
analysis methods for rock samples, on which we will put emphasis in the
following part.
1. Laboratory measurement (direct method)
Having acquired core it is possible to make as many measurements as are desired.
Compared to the cost of acquiring core, measurements and studies are generally
cheap and there is little point in stinting here. Any study should however look at
a representative range of samples and not simply ‘cherry-pick’ what appears to
be the best quality reservoir or most unusual mineralogy. It should also be noted
that some measurements are very time consuming and as commercial laboratories
only have finite resources, an overly ambitious study may take literally years to
complete (and therefore arrive too late to have much impact on a typical modern
development). Some measurements are also destructive and there will be a limit
to how many samples can be sacrificed to gain that information.
In order to calculate the value of porosity, any two of the following should be
measured:
x Bulk volume
x Pore volume
x Grain volume
Bulk volume measurements:
It can be determined directly from core dimensions if we have a fluid-saturated
regularly shaped core (normally cylindrical), or by fluid displacement methods
by weight where the density of the solid matrix and the displacing fluid is known,
or directly by volume displacement.
Displacement method:
17
Drop the core sample into a liquid and observe volume change of liquid; you must
prevent test liquid from entering pore space of sample by:
Coat with paraffin
Presaturate sample with test liquid
Use Mercury (Hg) as test liquid
Example (2)
A core sample coated with paraffin was immersed in a Russell tube. The dry sample
weighted 20.0gm. The dry sample coated with paraffin weighted 20.9 gm. The
paraffin coated sample displaced 10.9 cc of liquid. Assume the density of solid
paraffin is 0.9 gm/cc. What is the bulk volume of the sample?
Solution:
Weight of paraffin coating = 20.9 gm - 20.0 gm = 0.9 gm
Volume of paraffin coating = 0.9 gm / (0.9 gm/cc) = 1.0 cc
Bulk volume of sample = 10.9 cc - 1.0 cc = 9.9 cc
Matrix volume measurements:
ݐ݄݃݅݁ݓ ݕݎܦ
= ݁݉ݑ݈ݒ ݔ݅ݎݐܽܯ
ݕݐ݅ݏ݊݁݀ ݔ݅ݎݐܽܯ
Displacement method:
Reduce sample to particle size by crushing, then measure:
The volume of grain
The weight of grain
18
Example (3)
The core sample of Example (2) was stripped of the paraffin coat, crushed to grain
size, and immersed in a Russell tube. The volume of the grains was 7.7 cc. What
was the porosity of the sample? Is this effective or total porosity.
Solution:
Bulk Volume =9.9 cc
Matrix Volume=7.7 cc
ܸ െܸ 9.9 െ 7.7
= = = 0.22
ܸ 9.9
It is total porosity.
Example (4)
Calculate the porosity of a core sample when the following information is available:
Dry weight of sample = 427.3 gm
Weight of sample when saturated with water = 448.6 gm
Density of water = 1.0 gm/ cm3
Weight of water saturated sample immersed in water = 269.6 gm
Solution:
ܵܽݐݓ ݁ݎܿ ݀݁ݐܽݎݑݐ. ݅݊ ܽ݅ ݎെ ݀ݐݓ ݁ݎܿ ݕݎ.
ܸ =
ݎ݁ݐܽݓ ݂ ݕݐ݅ݏ݊݁ܦ
448.6 െ 427.3
ܸ = = 21.3 ܿ݉ଷ
1
ܵܽݐݓ ݁ݎܿ ݀݁ݐܽݎݑݐ. ݅݊ ܽ݅ ݎെ ܵܽݐݓ ݁ݎܿ ݀݁ݐܽݎݑݐ. ݅݊ ݎ݁ݐܽݓ
ܸ =
ݎ݁ݐܽݓ ݂ ݕݐ݅ݏ݊݁ܦ
19
448.6 െ 269.6
ܸ = = 179 ܿ݉ଷ
1
ܸ 21.3
= = = 0.119
ܸ 179
= 11.9%
What is the lithology of the sample?
ܸ = ܸ െ ܸ
ܸ = 179 െ 21.3 = 157.7 ܿ݉ଷ
ܹݐ. ݈݁݉ܽݏ ݕݎ݀ ݂ 427.3 ݃݉
ߩ = = = 2.71
݈ݒ ݔ݅ݎݐܽܯ. 157.7 ܿ݉ଷ
Then, the lithology is limestone.
Is the porosity effective or total? Why?
Effective, because fluid was forced into the pore space.
20
