Transport property evolution during hydrostatic and triaxial compression of a high porosity sandstone

Abstract

Permeability and porosity are two crucial properties related to underground gas storage. This research investigates the permeability and porosity evolution of a Vosges sandstone under different stress paths. Under hydrostatic stress, the influence of irreversible deformation on permeability is more significant than on porosity. The permeability is more sensible to confining pressure than porosity. Under non-hydrostatic loading, permeability decreases continuously with deviatoric stress. At volumetric compression stage, the decrease is due to compression and closure of pores and micro-cracks. At volumetric dilatancy stage, sand production in the shear band causes the permeability decrease. Sand production mainly occurs at volumetric dilatancy stage when closing to failure.

Keywords:

• Sandstone
• permeability
• porosity
• hydrostatic stress
• deviatoric stress

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [No. 41907227], China Postdoctoral Science Foundation [No. 2019M652478] and Laboratory for Marine Geology, Qingdao National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology [No. MGQNLM-TD201808].