Specific surface area and pore‐size distribution in clays and shales

ABSTRACT One of the biggest challenges in estimating the elastic, transport and storage properties of shales has been a lack of understanding of their complete pore structure. The shale matrix is predominantly composed of micropores (pores less than 2 nm diameter) and mesopores (pores with 2–50 nm diameter). These small pores in the shale matrix are mainly associated with clay minerals and organic matter and comprehending the controls of these clays and organic matter on the pore‐size distribution is critical to understand the shale pore network. Historically, mercury intrusion techniques are used for pore‐size analysis of conventional reservoirs. However, for unconventional shale reservoirs, very high…