Effect of Pore pressure

on Mohr’s Circle
Abdulrahman Mohamed
 Effect of Pore pressure on Mohr’s Circle
Pore pressure
• Because pore pressure and horizontal stresses are interrelated, changes in pore
pressure also cause similar changes in stress.
• While the exact relationship depends on the properties of the reservoir, it is
reasonable to assume that the change in horizontal stress is approximately two-
thirds of the change in pore pressure
• This leads to a considerable reduction in leak off pressure in a depleted reservoir
and an increase in horizontal stress where pore pressure increases.[1]
 Effect of Pore pressure on Mohr’s Circle
Effective Stress
• The mathematical relationship between stress and pore pressure is defined in
terms of effective stress. Implicitly, the effective stress is that portion of the
external load of total stress that is carried by the rock itself. The concept was
first applied to the behavior of soils subjected to both externally applied
stresses and pore pressure acting within the pore volume in a 1924 paper by
Terzaghi[1]
• 𝜎𝑒𝑓𝑓 = 𝜎𝑜𝑣 − 𝑃𝑝
 Effect of Pore pressure on Mohr’s Circle
Mohr's circle
• For faulted and hydraulically fractured rocks, the Mohr-Coulomb failure criterion
can be simplified by assuming a negligible cohesion of the faults or fractures[2]:
• 𝜏𝑓 = 𝑢𝑓 𝜎 ′ 𝑛
• where 𝜏𝑓 is the shear stress in the fractures
• 𝑢𝑓 is the friction coefficient of the fractures,
• 𝜎 ′ 𝑛 is the effective normal stress
 Effect of Pore pressure on Mohr’s Circle

Injection

Figure 1: Mohr’s circle representation of in situ effective stress showing depletion and injection in the Middle Bakken
reservoir (a) Reservoir with depletion (by 4285 psi). (b) Depleted reservoir with injection of 1200 psi. (2)
 Effect of Pore Pressure on Mohr’s Circle
• Mohr circle analysis describes a two-step mechanical response of the reservoir
through time, as shown in Figure 1 in the previous slide;
• First Case is the Reservoir Depletion:
• In this case the Mohr’s circle expands and move to the right as when the pore
pressure is reduced the effective stress increased to the right.
• Ted et al (2014), from their study on depleted reservoir stated that after two and a
half years of depletion is expected to diffuse into the surrounding formation on the
order of meters to tens of meters for permeabilities in the micro-Darcy range,
causing a localized drop in the total minimum stress[2]
 Effect of Pore Pressure on Mohr’s Circle
• Second case is the injection:
• In this case the Mohr’s circle it moves to the left while keeping its size unchanged
during re-pressurization this is due to reduction of effective stress. Also, it should be
noted as the Mohr circle moves to the left it will be near the Mohr Columb failure
envelope.
• It signifies the initiation of shear failure by slip on optimally oriented fractures. The
number of fracture orientations subject to shear failure increases as the Mohr circle
moves farther to the left.
• Furthermore, the increase in pore pressure during injection occurs over a time
period of minutes to hours and will not diffuse significantly into the matrix.[2]
 References

• 1. Lake, L. W., Fanchi, J. R., & Society of Petroleum Engineers (U.S.). (2006). Petroleum

engineering handbook: Volume II. Richardson, TX: Society of Petroleum Engineers.

• 2. Dohmen, Ted & Blangy, Jean-Pierre & Zhang, Jon. (2014). Microseismic depletion

delineation. Interpretation. 2. SG1-SG13. 10.1190/INT-2013-0164.1.