Mining or in situ disintegration of hard material – Tunnel recovery of fluid material
Patent
1984-07-06
1985-12-24
Suchfield, George A.
Mining or in situ disintegration of hard material
Tunnel recovery of fluid material
166251, 166259, 299 13, E21B 43247, E21C 4110, C10B 5720
Patent
active
045602050
ABSTRACT:
A method for forming an in situ oil shale retort in a subterranean formation containing oil shale is provided. The in situ retort contains a fragmented permeable mass of formation particles within top, bottom, and generally vertically extending side boundaries of unfragmented formation. A lower portion of the fragmented permeable mass of formation particles having a nonlevel top surface is initially formed in the retort. A void space is left within the retort boundaries extending between the nonlevel top surface of the fragmented mass lower portion and a generally horizontally extending free face of an overlying layer of unfragmented formation. Thereafter, the overlying layer of unfragmented formation is explosively expanded into the void space to thereby form the remaining portion of the fragmented mass in the retort. The overlying layer is expanded in a plurality of separate horizontally spaced regions with a time delay between explosive expansion of each successive region. The average vertical distance from the generally horizontal free face of each such region of the layer expanded earlier in the sequence to the nonlevel top surface of the lower portion of the fragmented mass is greater than the average vertical distance from the generally horizontal free face of each such region expanded later in the sequence to the nonlevel top surface of the lower portion of the fragmented mass.
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Lekas et al., "Fracturing Oil Shale with Nuclear Explosives for In-situ Retorting", Quarterly of the Colorado School of Mines, Jul. 1965, pp. 7-30.
Occidental Oil Shale Inc.
Suchfield George A.
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