Introduction
Tight oil refers to the oil preserved in tight sandstone or tight carbonate rocks with low matrix permeability— in these reservoirs, the individual wells generally have no natural productivity or their natural productivity is lower than the lower limit of industrial oil flow, but industrial oil production can be obtained under certain economic conditions and technical measures. Such measures include acid fracturing, multistage fracturing, horizontal wells, and multilateral wells.
At the moment, one the more well known tight oil plays is the Bakken which straddles the border between Canada (Saskatchewan) and the United States (North Dakota).
A great deal of information about the exploitation of tight oil resources comes from industry experiences in the Bakken and the predictions of future tight oil resource development described in this study are largely based on that knowledge. The Bakken tight oil play historically includes three zones, or members, within the Bakken Formation.