Abstract:In order to meet the requirements of environmental protection and efficient drilling of unconventional shale reservoirs, it is necessary to develop a new type of drilling fluid system with excellent performance and environmental friendliness. In this paper, ultrasonic treatment and precipitation method are combined to solve the problem. First, ultrasonic treatment is used to reduce the viscosity of starch solution with a high concentration of 5%. Thus, the precipitation method is used to prepare nano-starch particles under the condition of high concentration starch solution. After preparation by the method, the average size of the nano starch particles is as small as 30nm, and the particle size is mainly concentrated in 20-50nm with a relatively uniform distribution. The salt resistance of the nano starch particles is 20g/L NaCl at 150°C. After adding 1.0% nano starch particles to the base slurry, the apparent viscosity, plastic viscosity, dynamic shear force and fluid loss are 22.0 mPa.s, 14.5 mPa.s, 11.5 Pa and 9.3 mL, respectively. After aged at 150℃, the apparent viscosity, plastic viscosity, dynamic shear force and fluid loss after 16 hours are 21.1 mPa.s, 14.0 mPa.s, 10.8 Pa and 10.0 mL, respectively. More importantly, nano-starch particles and bentonite can form a network structure, which can increase the apparent viscosity, plastic viscosity, and shearing force of the drilling fluid, and decrease fluid loss, and it can still maintain excellent performance after aging under high temperature. The combination of ultrasonic treatment and sedimentation method is easy to be operated, low cost, easy to be promoted and applied. The formed technology can provide an important technical support for the development of a new type of nano-drilling fluid system.