Borehole Instability

Aims:
Reduce drilling costs by incorporating geomechanics
into the well planning and drilling process

• Optimizing mud weights and mud properties

• Minimising casing strings
• Optimizing wellbore trajectory
• Optimizing surface location

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• Maintaining a stable wellbore is one of the major challenges

when drilling a well.

• Studies indicate that unscheduled events relating to wellbore

instability account for more than 10% of well costs, with estimates over
$1 billion in annual cost to the industry.

•Preventing shale instability is a high priority to every phase of the drilling

fluids industry, from research and development efforts to field
implementation by the mud engineer.

•New technologies are continually being developed and applied and earlier
technologies refined.

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• Mechanical stress
Tension failure: fracturing; lost circulation.
Compression failure: spalling and collapse or plastic flow.
Abrasion and impact.

• Chemical interactions with the drilling fluid.

Shale hydration, swelling and dispersion.
Dissolution of soluble formations.

• Physical interactions with the drilling fluid.

Erosion.
Wetting along pre-existing fractures (brittle shale).
Fluid invasion - pressure transmission.

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Drilling Fluids Management Issues

• Hole cleaning problems

• Wellbore erosion
• Physical impact damage
• Mud weights and pore pressures
• Surge and swab pressures
• Wellbore stresses

Chemical conditions also must be evaluated such as:

• Reactivity of the failing formation

• Chemical compatibility of the mud system
• Possible wellbore dissolution

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Mud System Limitations

A number of restrictions may be placed on the types of mud systems and
products that can be used.

These restrictions include:

• The need to obtain specific formation evaluation

(minimally altered cores or a particular log).

• Local health, safety and environmental regulations

• Cost, logistics and availability of materials

• Other problems that override wellbore stability concerns

(lost circulation, for example)

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Pressure
Overburden Pressure
• The volume and weight of all formations and fluids above a given formation.

• The total stress imposed by the overburden that a subsurface

formation is subjected to is called the geostatic, lithostatic or total
overburden pressure.

Pore Pressure And Intergranular Pressure

Total overburden pressure is supported by the rock in two ways:

• Through intergranular pressure: a matrix stress due to the force transmitted

through grain-to-grain mechanical contact.

• When the sediments are not compacted enough to form grain-to-grain contact, the
overburden is supported in part by the pore pressure, causing abnormal pressure.

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Stress
The overburden exerts a vertical stress to the formation with a resulting
outward horizontal stress, depending on the mechanical properties of the
rock.

Subsurface stresses are resolved into the orientation of the three

principal stress planes in three-dimensional space which are all perpendicular
to each other.

These are
• Maximum principal stress
• Intermediate principal stress
• Minimum principal stress

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Hole Angle and Stress

= Maximum Stress / Overburden

= Intermediate Stress

= Minimum Stress

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Stress

The Fracture Pressure is essentially equal to the minimum principal

stress.

In a non-tectonically stressed environment:

• Maximum stress: is vertical

due to the matrix component of the overburden

Intermediate and minimum principal stresses : horizontal

and of equal magnitude.

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Extended Leak-Off Test XLOT

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Angular Cavings
Produced from rock shear failure. When the sheared surfaces are fresh,
they are from borehole breakouts –
drilling-induced near-wellbore shear failure

Borehole wall

Sheared surfaces

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An example of UBI image of borehole

breakout where angular caving are
produced

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Tabular:
• Characterized by having one or more flat and smooth surfaces; parallel surfaces are common

• Typically from failures along weak bedding planes, or cleavages in pre-existing fracture/joint sets

• UBI/FMI logs show failures are much more pronounced on one side of the borehole

Preexisting cleavages in nature fracture/joint sets

Bedding planes

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Splintery:

• Characterized by long, thin morphologies with fresh plume structure – a

key feature of tensile splitting in rocks

• Typically from near wellbore tensile spalling in the radial direction – due
to drilling too fast through low permeability shale, or because the mud
weight is lower than the pore pressure in the adjacent formation

• Failure should be evenly distributed around the borehole in

homogeneous formations, but could show preferential enlargement
where tectonic or unequal stresses occur

Top view Side view

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Remedial Actions
For angular cavings:
Raise mud weight if pore/frac window allows
Manage hole cleaning if no extra mud weight window available
Optimize well trajectory in future wells

For tabular cavings:

Minimise fluid loss
Reduce surge, swab forces and drill string vibration
Avoid back reaming

For splintery cavings:

Increase mud weight
Reduce penetration rate

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Deviation
When a well is deviated from vertical, these stresses tend to make the
wellbore less stable and more mud weight is generally required, depending
on the rock strength.

To evaluate the stress in a deviated well, it is useful to resolve the principal

stresses into a different orientation, so that they are:

• Radial
• Tangential
• Axial to the well path.

Using this orientation, the mechanical stability of the formation

can be calculated for a given set of conditions.

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A plot can be made of the effect of the hydrostatic pressure

on total differential stress (tangential minus radial) of the rock

Various radial angles around the wellbore are shown from

one side (at 0°) to the bottom (at 90°) and on to the other side (at 180°)

• If the differential stress is less than the rock’s tensile strength

(shown as a negative number), tensile failure or fracture will occur.

• If the mud weight is less than the fracture gradient, the fracture or
failure will die out near the wellbore

• If the mud weight exceeds the fracture gradient, lost circulation will occur

• If the differential stress is greater that the rock’s compressive strength, spalling and
wellbore collapse or plastic intrusion (salt) will occur.

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Wellbore failure due to mechanical stress is

most often caused by one of two situations.

• First, the mud weight is too high, inducing a fracture (rock

in tension) that causes lost circulation

• Second, the mud weight is too low, causing the rock to cave in
(spalling) or collapse (rock in compression).

• Mechanical abrasion and impact from the drillstring can also cause
wellbore enlargement and lead to instability in brittle rocks.

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Rocks have weak tensile strengths

• Unconsolidated sand or fractured formations have a tensile strength of zero

• Sandstones tend to have lower tensile strength than shale

Mud weight is usually increased to control the flow of gas and liquids into
the well by maintaining a slightly higher hydrostatic pressure than the
pore pressure.

If the mud pressure exceeds the fracture gradient of the rock, a fracture is initiated,
and lost circulation will occur.

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Calculated Safe Fluid Densities

Example of Calculated Safe Mud Weight Range

90
80 Collapse Fracture
Gradient Gradient
Hole Deviation (Degrees)

70
60
50
40 Compressive Stable Tensile
Failure Wellbore Failure
30
20
10

0
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2.0 2.2 2.4 2.6
Mud Weight (S.G.)
From McLean, et. al. SPE Paper No. 20405 12

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• The fracture will be oriented in a plane parallel to the

direction of the maximum principal stress and
perpendicular to the minimum stress, usually resulting
in a vertical fracture opening toward the least principal
stress.

• Fracturing and lost circulation will have a detrimental

effect on wellbore integrity and stability, particularly in
medium to hard formations.

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Borehole Ballooning

• Some “soft” shales and high-water content gumbos can deform plastically, causing an
increase in the size and volume of the hole (ballooning).

• The ballooning theory is that if the mud weight is excessive, the hole can be enlarged
(ballooned) and trap pressure like a pressure vessel.

• This situation in turn can lead to indications of a kick and allow mud to flow back to the
surface without having formation fluids flow into the well.

• This concept is somewhat controversial and poorly understood. It is not clear whether
ballooning symptoms are caused by opening and closing fractures or by plastic
deformation of the wellbore.

• In any case, well control situations should be handled in the safest possible manner.

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Rocks have compressive strengths that generally range from 4,000 to

15,000 psi.

If the mud weight is insufficient to balance this maximum allowable stress of the
rock, one of two failure mechanisms will occur:

• Wellbore enlargement due to spalling or collapse in brittle rocks.

• Wellbore deformation and tight hole due to plastic flow in plastic

formations, like salt, squeezing the hole closed.

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• Stressed shales and pressured shales are two special wellbore-

stability problems that occur because there is insufficient mud
weight to satisfy compressive strengths.

• Because they are not readily identifiable with an increase in gas,

the need for higher mud weights is more difficult to identify.

•When these types of shale problems are encountered, an increased

amount of cavings will be observed at the shale shaker.

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Often a change in the size and shape (larger and more splintery or angular) of the
cavings accompanies the increased volume.

Many words are used to describe shale failing in compression:

• heaving
• sloughing
• caving
• spalling.

These shale fragments are usually much larger than the drill cuttings, are angular
or splintery in shape and may have a concave appearance.

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Mud weights are usually increased to control the flow of gas and liquids
into the well.

If the formation is stressed due to tectonic forces, then mud

weight may be needed to prevent wellbore instability.

Shale of this type may be described as shale that does not hydrate appreciably
but sloughs into the hole when penetrated.

These shales are found in areas where diastrophic or tectonic movements

(the process by which the earth’s crust is deformed, producing continents,
oceans, mountains, etc.) have occurred.

The shales may be inclined considerably from the horizontal, in

steeply dipping bedding planes. Forces may be acting upon the formations
which, when relieved, cause the shale to fall into the hole.

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Tectonic Stress Effects

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Unusual wellbore instability problems can be encountered while drilling

in tectonically active regions.

The usual operational responses might be entirely inappropriate if the physical

mechanism of the hole deterioration is not properly understood.

Experiences in such areas has led to the following observations:

• Tectonic instability is strictly mechanical and not related to, or solved

by, chemical incompatibilities.

• Mechanical instability is related to stress-induced failure of weak, often

fractured or faulted, formations.

• Fracturing causes lost circulation and wellbore instability when mud

pressures approached the magnitude of the minimum stress.

• Wellbore break out and collapse will occur when mud pressures are too
low to maintain the rock below its compressive strength.

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• Orientating the well path with respect to tectonic forces may help
relieve problems

• Pressure transmission and mud invasion away from the wellbore tends
to de-stabilize the hole

• Poor drilling practices can contribute to destabilizing the hole, while

good drilling practices can help tolerate some instability

• Good communication and teamwork are critical to cost-effective and

timely solutions.

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Some recommendations are:

• Monitor hole conditions and shale shaker for signs of instability

and the need to improve hole cleaning to relieve symptoms of instability
(fill and bridges).

• Use fast but smooth drilling techniques to reduce exposure time

and minimize mechanical disturbances.

• Select casing depths to isolate problem intervals.

• Minimize reaming to reduce mechanical disturbance, unless absolutely

necessary.

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Pressured Shales
• Mud weights are usually increased to control the flow of gas and liquids
into the well.

• If the formation is impermeable with no adjacent permeable

formation, like a massive shale or salt body, then it may be difficult to
identify an increase in pressure due to the lack of background/connection
gas or the influx of pore fluids.

• Troublesome shales associated with geopressures

have generally been restricted geographically to areas of more
recent geology, usually post- Cretaceous.

• Shales of this type are normally massive, but not homogeneous.

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Sand lenses are both porous and permeable

and do not compress or compact to any degree

Any fluids entering these lenses are thus trapped and completely isolated by the surrounding
shale. In the passage of geologic time, the pore space would become completely filled, and
the fluid that is trapped could reach a pressure equal to the overburden.

There may not be an indication of high pressure or flow of gas or liquids into the well if
permeable formations are not present.

The mud weight is usually not increased without an indication of increasing pressure, resulting
in the hydrostatic pressure of the mud column being much less than that of the pressured
shale.

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This pressure differential will attempt to relieve itself along the path of least resistance.

It is believed it will do so along the bedding planes separating the sand and shale,
causing the shale to flake off and fall into the hole.

Shales thus weakened will continue to slough until the mud weight is increased to the point
where the hydrostatic head balances the shales’ pressure.

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Other pressured shales may actually contain gas:

• Wellbore stability may not be compromised depending on the rock

strength, and the cause of the problem will be obvious by gas-cut mud

• It may not be necessary to increase the mud weight to a point where all
shale-gas is contained, as this has led to lost circulation, but only to a
point where the formation is not failing.

• Solving such a shale problem caused by pressure is relatively

simple, i.e. increase the mud weight to create sufficient hydrostatic pressure
to contain formation pressure.

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Besides increasing density, there are other practices that aid in controlling
the problem by minimizing further reduction in hydrostatic pressure:

• Keep the hole full of mud while pulling out of the hole. This
keeps the hydrostatic pressure at the highest value possible at all
times.

• Low viscosity, low gel strengths of the mud will aid in the prevention
of swabbing. Thinner wall cakes obtained by lower filtration
will also avoid swabbing the hole.

• Pull slowly through the section giving the problem. Compaction

forces fluids out of shales into permeable formations resulting in
formation pressures equal to or approaching overburden pressure.

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• Wellbore deformation and tight hole can occur in plastic-yielding rocks

like salt.

• Salt is a material that will flow (creep) under pressure and

squeeze into the wellbore, causing tight hole or possibly closing the hole
or sticking the drill pipe.

• Salt is ductile and transmits most of the overburden stress

into the horizontal directions, so the three stresses are equal.

• Salt is more plastic at high temperatures, above 225°F (107°C).

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• Salt creep is more of a problem for deep salt formations below 10,000 ft.

• In many parts of the world, salt formations are drilled with

lower mud weights than are required to prevent salt creep,
but with undersaturated salt muds which allow
dissolution to prevent tight hole.

• This is most applicable in shallow to intermediate

salt formations with temperatures below 225°F (107°C).

• “Soft” shales and high-water-content gumbos may also

deform plastically due to insufficient mud weight, causing
tight hole and swabbing on trips.

• While there are often a combination of factors which

Affect tight hole, such as swelling and filter-cake thickness,
increasing the mud weight usually alleviates tight hole
and swabbing symptoms in soft shales and gumbo-type formations.

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Water Sensitive Shale

• Wellbore instability and enlargement are also affected by the chemistry

of the water-base drilling fluid and its effect on shale.

• Numerous classification schemes have been devised to attempt ranking

shales according to their reactivity.

• These schemes usually assign a letter or number to each

category of shale according to its reactivity.

• Most often, water-sensitive or

hydratable shales contain high concentrations of montmorillonite clay.

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Useful measurements are :

• CEC

• Total clay content

• Water content
• Surface area
• Hardness.

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Hydration
Surface
Surface hydration occurs when a small volume of water is strongly
adsorbed onto the planar surfaces of the clays which causes little
softening or swelling, but can lead to excessive stresses if the swelling
is confined.

Osmotic Adsorption.
• Osmotic swelling occurs when a large volume of weakly held water is
attracted to the clay surfaces by electrostatic forces.

• Causes softening and significant swelling as the adjacent clay layers

hydrate water and expand.

• Does not generate excessive stresses, even when confined, and can be
substantially reduced if a low-activity salt mud is used.
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• Shales that contain montmorillonite may

adsorb water from the drilling fluid and hydrate or disperse.

• The mode of failure is usually either a constriction of the hole

from a softened swollen zone or spalling of relatively firm fragments.

• Osmotic adsorption and hydration will soften and swell the exposed
wellbore in soft, dispersible shales, causing a tight hole and increasing
the potential for dispersion.

• Brittle failure of relatively firm fragments occurs with salt-saturated

fluids in soft, dispersible shales and with older, firmer, “brittle” shales in
non-saturated water-base muds.

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It is important to prevent the transfer of water between the

drilling fluid and the shale, which causes the shale to be altered. This can
be achieved by balancing the activity (ion concentration) of the mud with
the shale’s.

Oil and synthetic muds are highly effective at stabilizing wells drilled in
water-sensitive shales:

• They oil- or synthetic-wet the exposed formations, preventing interaction with any water.

• They usually incorporate low activity, emulsified calcium chloride brine to

achieve a balanced activity.

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Mud Systems to stabilise water sensitive clays

Lime Mud
Gypsum Mud
Calcium Chloride Mud
Silicate Mud
Potassium Mud
Calcium Acetate and Formate Mud
Calcium Nitrate Mud
Salt Mud
Surfactant Mud
Lignosulphonate Mud
Partially Hydrolyzed Poly Acrylamide (PHPA)
Cationic Polymer Mud
Oil Based Mud

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Salt Systems
• With the potassium systems, base exchange of potassium for interlayer clay cations
converts the shale and clay to a less reactive state.

• In salt systems, the low activity reduces osmotic swelling and limits softening.

Polymer Systems
• In a sufficient concentration, polymers work to coat exposed shales and cuttings,
“encapsulating” them with a bound layer of polymer.

• This limits the ability of water to interact with the shale and helps prevent
cuttings from dispersing.

• Polymers also increase the filtrate viscosity of the fluid so the

transfer of water will be slowed.

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Water-insoluble materials and plugging agents can substantially

improve wellbore stability.

They further reduce water invasion in shales by plugging the micro-pores.

These materials are particularly effective in firm shales that tend to be

micro-fractured.

These additives include:

• Oil and non-aqueous synthetic liquids.
• “Cloud-point” polyglycols.
• Insoluble polyglycols and lubricants
• Asphalt
• Gilsonite
• Sulphonated asphalt blends.

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Solubility

Several formations are somewhat soluble in water-base mud.

These include:
• Salt formations
• Gypsum and Anhydrite

Wellbore stability may be compromised if the soluble formation is

allowed to wash out.

Other problems may arise such as:

• Hole cleaning
• Obtaining a satisfactory cement job

Solubility is a complex phenomenon that is affected by

temperature, pressure, salinity and pH.

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Salt Formations

• Salt is readily soluble in any undersaturated water-base mud

• It is important to limit wellbore enlargement in mobile salt formations

to achieve a good cement job for maximum strength and resistance to
point loading so that casing collapse will not occur.

• Gypsum and anhydrite become more soluble as salinity increases.

• If wellbore stability and a gauge hole cannot be achieved in a gyp or anhydrite

zone, then a gyp or lime-base calcium system should be used.

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While chemical inhibition and higher mud weights may help minimize
the problem, they are not as effective as sealing the formation with
plugging or plastering agents.

• Controlling the high-pressure, high-temperature filtration

• Controlling filter-cake quality with:

Polymers
Adequate concentration of bentonite,

• Use water insoluble materials and pore plugging agents.

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Evaluation and analysis of instability symptoms
Front Side

Instability warning signs

• excessive cavings
Front Side
• fill on connections May be
striated
• tripping difficulties Scale
• torque,
• stuck pipe O.5" to 1.5"

Delicate
shape Typically Blocky
cracked Rectangular
Shapes

Plan View

Plan View

Concave Profile

A Typical shale caving B Typical shale caving

caused by underbalanced produced by stress relief
drilling
The magnitude or volume of failed rock should be estimated and
recorded with the other drilling parameters.
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Record Information and assess

 The number and location of specific incidents should be
recorded
 such as pipe sticking,fill or packing-off, reaming and redrilling.

 All of this information can then be organized and correlated

with time and depth to detect
 the location and quantify the severity of critical sections in the
 well.

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Determine And Understand Failure Mechanism

All of the monitored and plotted parameters are then evaluated to
identify the most probable mechanism causing the instability. The most
useful symptoms used to indicate the mechanism responsible for wellbore
instability are:
• Cavings analysis
• Tripping difficulties
• Drilling conditions
• Mud system analysis

• In-situ conditions. These symptoms should be evaluated based on an

interdisciplinary knowledge of the causes of wellbore instability to determine
the most likely failure mechanism.

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Determine And Understand Failure Mechanism

All of the monitored and plotted parameters are then evaluated to

identify the most probable mechanism causing the instability. The most
useful symptoms used to indicate the mechanism responsible for wellbore
instability are:

• Cavings analysis
• Tripping difficulties
• Drilling conditions
• Mud system analysis
• In-situ conditions. These symptoms should be evaluated based on an
interdisciplinary knowledge of the causes of wellbore instability to determine
the most likely failure mechanism.

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Considering Proposed Changes

Once the monitoring and determination steps have produced parameters,
organize and analyse this data to obtain qualitative solutions and
evaluate proposed changes.

One good way to do this is through the use of

a decision tree or flowchart approach to evaluate the possible failure
mechanism and to identify the most promising remedies.

After arriving at a proposed solution, a corrective measure should be applied and the
results used as feedback into the method and decision tree method. A
decision tree or flowchart, for evaluating the cause of excessive cavings,
provides a logical path for identification of the mechanism and a qualitative
solution.

Maintaining hole stability while drilling shale sections can be particularly

troublesome. Simple solutions do not always exist, but good drilling
practices combined with good mud practices are most often successful.
Analysis of the mechanical stress/strain relationships has helped to
develop the proper density requirements for hole stability.

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