Abstract:
CO
2 fracturing, replacement, and displacement are critical methods for enhancing shale gas recovery. This technology enables reservoir fracturing and CH
4 displacement, thereby improving shale gas production while achieving CO
2 geological storage. It is therefore essential to summarize and understand existing technical advances in CO
2 fracturing, replacement, and displacement to guide future research in this field. This paper presents a review from the perspective of scientific mechanisms, covering supercritical CO
2 fracturing, CO
2 replacement of CH
4, CO
2 displacement of CH
4, and key scientific issues related to enhancing shale gas recovery via the integrated CO
2 fracturing-replacement-displacement technology. The results indicate that this integrated technology is characterized as green, clean, environmentally friendly, and resource-efficient. Supercritical CO
2 fracturing offers several advantages over hydraulic fracturing, including reduced rock strength, maintained stability of clay minerals, increased pore pressure, phase transition-induced fracturing, and thermal stress cracking. Furthermore, compared to CH
4, CO
2 exhibits a smaller molecular diameter, lower adsorption temperature, smaller self-diffusion coefficient, and quadrupole moment characteristics. CO
2 molecules can replace adsorbed CH
4 through competitive adsorption, and CO
2 can displace CH
4 under pressure—a process influenced by factors such as temperature, pressure, and pore diameter. Currently, further research is needed in areas such as viscosity enhancement of supercritical CO
2, the microscopic mechanism of CO
2/CH
4 competitive adsorption, quantification of adsorption sites, flow and mechanical mechanisms of CO
2 displacement of CH
4, reservoir modification, and CO
2 geological storage and monitoring. The combined CO
2 fracturing-replacement-displacement technology shows great promise as a crucial method for alleviating energy pressure and contributing to the achievement of carbon peaking and carbon neutrality goals.