Characterization of Microscopic Pore Structures of Rock Salt through Mercury Injection and Nitrogen Absorption Tests

Microscopic pore structure of rock salt plays a dominant role in its permeability. In this paper, microscopic pore structure of a set of rock salt samples collected from Yunying salt mine of Hubei province in China is investigated by high pressure mercury injection, rate-controlled mercury penetration, and nitrogen absorption tests. The pore size distribution is further evaluated based on fractal analysis. The results show that pore size of rock salt varies from 0.01 to 300 μm with major concentration of pore size smaller than 1.00 μm. The pore’s radiuses are mainly distributed within a range between 15 and 50 nm. The research further reveals that the pore channel size of rock salt is randomly distributed, but the distribution of pore throat radius fits very well with fractal law. By analysis of permeability, it is found that the maximum and medium radius of the pore throat have significant impacts on permeability. Porosity is not apparently related to the permeability of rock salt. The higher the fractal dimension is, the higher the impacts on permeability of the small throat are detected and the lower the influence on permeability of the big throat is exhibited. It indicates that the small throat determines majorly the permeability of rock salt. The findings obtained from this study provide an insight into understanding the characteristics of microscopic pore structure of rock salt.