Efficient production of shale gas by in-situ retorting. New Approach

Employees of INFOCOM LTD LLC (www.ia.ua) together with Corr. AES of Ukraine Shvartsman L.Ya and Ph.D. Bazhenov E.V. developed and patented a new effective method for the production of shale gas by the method of in-situ retorting of oil shale by resistive-arc heating of the oil shale formation with thermally zoned areas (TZ-RA method).

The new method of resistive arc heating of a combustible reservoir has a number of advantages over other widely used methods of shale gas production, such as the fracking process and off-site retorting.

Recall that the fracking process implements the technology of “hydraulic fracturing”, which involves the use of chemical reagents over large areas and intensive violation of the integrity of the subsoil, leading to environmentally unfavorable consequences. In addition, this is a very expensive way to extract shale gas. For information, according to the experience of the United States, the cost of constructing one well that provides gas production in this way is $ 2.6 – 4 million. In addition, each such well annually carries out 3-4 technological operations of “hydraulic fracturing” worth $ 250.0 thousand each.

Another method used for onshore processing of oil shale using the out-of-situ retorting technology, although it makes it possible to compare oil shale with high-quality coal in terms of economic efficiency, but from the point of view of INFOCOM LTD employees, the method has limitations caused by environmental problems of recycling large volumes of waste rock and economic limitations with increasing depth occurrence of working seams and an increase in the cost of delivering raw materials to the place of processing.

Thus, at present, the search for a more efficient, environmentally friendly and cheap technology is a priority – more and more arguments are given to prove the effectiveness of in-situ retorting.

The technology of in-situ retorting by resistive-arc heating of oil shale formation by thermo-zoned areas proposed by INFOCOM LTD is devoid of the identified shortcomings of other methods: initial capital investments are reduced and the time for obtaining a commercial product is reduced, process implementation is simplified mining. A feature of the method under consideration is the possibility of creating a limited thermally zoned area inside the formation, the parameters of which are calculated by calculation in terms of the thickness and depth of the working layer, the thermophysical properties of oil shale and the surrounding rock mass. The ability to control the speed of movement of the working area allows you to control the temperature gradient inside it, and hence the rate of propagation of the reaction. Thus, in addition to regulating productivity, it became possible to quickly control the composition of the resulting reaction products.

An additional advantage of the proposed method is the admissibility of its adaptation for thin shale formations, for deep-seated formations, and ensuring the rapid production of marketable products with high values ​​of the energy efficiency of production.

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