A Non-Isothermal Constitutive Model for Chemically Active Elastoplastic Rocks

Hydration/dehydration of water-active rocks under non-isothermal conditions is encountered in many industries, in particular the drilling industry. Water-active rocks can adsorb water on their basal crystal surfaces on both the external, and, in the case of expanding lattice clays, the inter-layer surfaces. There are two main mechanisms in which the instability may occur for a structure built in water-active rocks. First mechanism is the change in stresses resulted from mechanical, hydraulic, chemical and thermal interaction, which we formulate based on the concept of non-equilibrium thermodynamics. Second mechanism illustrates the change in mechanical properties of the rock due to physic-chemical interaction between the rock and exposed fluid. We postulate the later mechanism in terms of chemically active plastic deformation by using the modified Cam Clay model. The complete governing equations for non-isothermal chemo-poro-elastoplastic rock are therefore presented. A three-dimensional finite element model is then developed to solve the obtained governing equations. From the numerical results, it was found that the effect of temperature coupling term on stress cannot be ignored when non-isothermal conditions are encountered. However, this effect is almost trivial on pore pressure. It was also revealed that the effect of change in the shale’s mechanical properties on stability due to physic-chemical interaction is as important as change in stresses due to mechanical, hydraulic, chemical and thermal interactions.