Sand production is one of the challenges facing the oil industry. This paper reviews the latest research advances in chemical sand control and aims to provide a reference for related researchers. Firstly, the commonly used chemical sand control materials are introduced. Second, recent advances in chemical sand control are reviewed, including materials, methods, and processes. Third, laboratory methods for sand control research are presented. Finally, the gaps and challenges of chemical sand control materials are pointed out, and possible future directions for chemical sand control methods are envisioned.

More than 90% of the natural gas hydrate resources are reserved as marine clayey silt sediments. It is of great significance to efficiently develop a clayey silt hydrate. At present, there are problems of low single well production and small depressurization range in its production test, which is still a long way from commercial exploitation. The combination of hydraulic fracturing technology and other methods such as depressurization method is regarded as one of the potential technical means to achieve the commercial exploitation of the hydrate. However, compared with shale gas reservoirs and coalbed methane reservoirs, clayey silt hydrate reservoirs have special mechanical properties, resulting in unique hydraulic fracturing processes. Therefore, it is necessary to study the fracture initiation and propagation laws of clayey silt hydrate reservoirs. To this end, we carried out large-scale (30 × 30 × 30 cm) true triaxial hydraulic fracturing experiments using a simulated material with similar mechanics, porosity, and permeability to clayey silt hydrate-bearing sediments. The effects of completion method, fracturing method, and fracturing fluid displacement on hydraulic fracture propagation of clayey silt hydrate-bearing sediments were studied. The results showed that a perforated completion can significantly increase the fracture reconstruction area and decrease the fracture initiation pressure compared to an open hole completion. Due to the small horizontal stress difference, it is feasible to carry out temporary plugging fracturing in clayey silt hydrate reservoirs. Temporary plugging fracturing can form steering fractures and significantly improve fracture complexity and fracture area. Increasing the fracturing fluid displacement can significantly increase the fracture area as well. When conducting fracturing in clayey silt hydrate-bearing sediments, the fracturing fluid filtration area is obviously larger than the fracture propagation area. Therefore, it is recommended to use a high-viscosity fracturing fluid to reduce the filtration of the fracturing fluid and improve the fracturing fluid efficiency. This study preliminarily explores the feasibility of temporary plugging fracturing in clayey silt hydrate reservoirs and analyzes the effect of completion methods on the propagation of fracturing fractures, which can provide a reference for the research conducted on the fracturing stimulation of clayey silt hydrate reservoirs.

Hot water injection has been a simple and promising method of thermally stimulating the extraction of hydrates, which promotes the dissociation of natural gas hydrates and improves gas production. However, the temperature region influenced by injecting hot water requires further research and evaluation. In this study, a computational model of the temperature field in the hydrate reservoir during hot water injection with the finite volume method, considering coupled gas–liquid two‐phase flow, heat conduction, and hydrate dissociation, was developed. The model focuses on hot water injection vertical wells completed with slotted liners in the Shenhu Sea area hydrate reservoir, which can consider the heterogeneity of porosity, permeability, and saturation. It also analyzes the effects of injection volume, injection rate, hot water temperature, and other factors on the variations in temperature and pressure distribution. The results indicate that selecting the appropriate injection volume, the temperature of hot water, and the injection rate can promote hydrate decomposition and expand the range of heat stimulation reservoir temperature. Reservoir heterogeneity leads to heterogeneity of the hydrate dissociation front and temperature influence range, and the influence range of heat stimulation is larger than homogeneous reservoir.

This work takes the natural gas hydrate (NGH) reservoir in the Shenhu area at the South China Sea as the target. Using the quartz sand, calcite grains, and illite powder as the main mineral composites, and Portland cement as the bonding material, the host skeleton with similar porosity and mechanical properties to the target reservoir were prepared. Ice was used to simulate natural gas hydrates for their high similarity in mechanical properties and distributions within porous host. The ice saturation in the host skeleton is quantitatively controlled by the quality method. As an analogical simulation, artificial samples with different ice saturations were tested by uniaxial compression measurements and the Brazilian tensile tests, aiming to reveal the mechanical behavior of NGH sediments. The results indicated that the plasticity of the artificial sample increases and its damage form transitions from brittleness to ductility as the ice saturation increases. The effects of free water and ice on the strength of saturated samples are quite different. The free water tends to reduce the strength of the sample due to illite hydration and change of internal friction. The bonding effect of ice tends to increase the strength of the sample, while the ice could also reduce the internal friction. When the ice saturation is larger than 30%, the compressive and tensile strengths of the sample increase with ice saturation, which could be regressed as y_c = 2.2628S + 0.8322, and y_t = 0.411S + 0.0273, respectively. The constitutive model was developed based on the equivalent medium theory and the D‐P criterion, which could describe the experiment data well with deviations less than 10%.

During the development of natural gas hydrates, it is important to ensure the stability of the reservoir. The hydrate reservoirs in the South China Sea are clayey silt sediments, which are prone to sand production and collapse during hydrate dissociation. This study innovatively proposes the idea of consolidation-acidizing for NGH reservoir modification. Based on the core parameters of well A drilling in the Shenhu Sea area of the South China Sea, NGH sediment skeleton samples were artificially prepared. Core sensitivity testing indicates that the NGH reservoir has the potential for acidizing modification. After using tetraethyl orthosilicate to solidify the sample, it was found that Young’s modulus of the sample increased by 58.8%, and the compressive strength increased by 54.78%. Although the porosity decreased by 39.33%, the pores were not completely blocked. After the acidizing experiment, the permeability of the consolidated sample was 2.88 mD, and the porosity increased by 10.63%; The permeability of the unconsolidated sample was 1.86 mD, and the porosity decreased by 10.73%. The CT scan images also showed that the pores of the sample after consolidation-acidizing developed uniformly without significant deformation; The unconsolidated sample undergoes severe deformation and sand production after acidizing. This study demonstrates that the consolidation-acidizing modification method is feasible in clayey silt hydrate reservoirs.

Hydraulic jetting is a form of fracturing that involves using a high-pressure jet of water to create fractures in the reservoir rock with a nozzle serving as the central component of the hydraulic sandblasting perforation tool. In this study, the flow behavior of the nozzle is simulated numerically in the framework of a SST k-ω turbulence model. The results show that the nozzle structure can significantly influence the jet performance and related cavitation effect. Through orthogonal experiments, the nozzle geometric parameters are optimized, and the following configuration is found accordingly: contraction angle 20°, contraction segment length 6 mm, cylindrical segment diameter 6 mm, cylindrical segment length 12 mm, spread segment length 10 mm, and spread angle 55°.