Professional Documents
Culture Documents
1
5/9/2014
Introduction
Objective: to create highly conductive paths some
distance away from the wellbore into the reservoir.
o Execution of a hydraulic fracture involves
the injection of fluids at a pressure sufficiently
high to cause "tensile failure" of the rock.
o At the fracture initiation pressure, often known
as the "breakdown pressure, the rock opens.
o As additional fluids are injected, the opening
is extended and the fracture propagates.
o A properly executed hydraulic fracture results in a "path," connected to the well,
that has a much higher permeability than the surrounding formation.
Introduction
o Minimum hydraulic fracturing candidate well selection screening criteria
2
5/9/2014
length ;
conductivity;
o In almost all calculations, the fracture length, which must be the conductive length and not the created
hydraulic length, is assumed to consist of two equal halflengths, xf, in each side of the well.
= (Ability of fracture to deliver oil/gas to well)/(Ability of formation to deliver gas into the fracture)
w
o -Related to Prats a (called the relative capacity): CfD = /2a
where:k is the reservoir permeability, k f is the fracture permeability, and w is the propped fracture width.
3
5/9/2014
o The equivalent skin effect, sf: the result of a hydraulic fracture of a certain length and conductivity
& can be added to the well inflow equations in the usual manner.=> sf is pseudo skin factor
used after the treatment to describe the productivity:
2kh 1 2kh
J J D
B ln[ re ] 0.75 s B
f
rw
o Prats (1961): the concept of dimensionless effective wellbore radius rwD
for small values of a, or high conductivity fractures, the rwD is equal to 0.5, leading to rw
= xf /2; which suggests that for these large-conductivity fractures the reservoir drains to a
well with an effective wellbore equal to half of the fracture half-length.
Since the effective wellbore must be as large as possible, values of a larger than unity m
ust be avoided because the effective wellbore radius decreases rapidly.
=> hydraulic fractures should be designed for a < 1 or CfD > 1.6
for large values of a, the slope of the curve is equal to 1, implying a linear relationship
between rw and a that is approximately rw = kf w/4k; Which suggest that for low
conductivity fractures, the increase in rw does not depend on fracture length but instead
on fracture permeability-width product,which must be maximized.
4
5/9/2014
Notation
rw wellbore radius, m (or ft)
5
5/9/2014
q Jp
Production rate is proportional to drawdown, defined as average
pressure in the reservoir minus wellbore flowing pressure
Drawdown
2kh
q J D p
B
Circular:
1 Dimensionless
JD Productivity Index
r 3
ln e s
rw 4
2kh 2kh
J J
r or r
B ln 0.472 e s f B ln 0.472 e
rw r 'w
Prats
f (C fD )
2kh 2kh
J
0.472re x 0.472re
B ln s f ln f B ln f
xf rw xf
Cinco-Ley
6
5/9/2014
Dimensionless Productivity
Index, sf and f and rw
1 1
JD or JD
re re
ln 0.472 sf ln 0.472
rw r 'w
Prats
f (C fD )
1 1
JD
0.472re x 0.472re
f
ln s f ln f ln
xf rw x f
Cinco-Ley
Factor f
7
5/9/2014
oExample:
8
5/9/2014
9
5/9/2014
Moreover, since
10
5/9/2014
11
5/9/2014
Rock Properties
Shear modulus:
Rock Properties
Tensile Strength: The maximum stress that a material can tolerate without rupture in a uniaxial tensile experiment is
the tensile stress.
Fracture Toughness: The critical value of the stress intensity factor, or fracture toughness, characterizes a rocks
resistance to the propagation of an existing fracture.
Permeability: The larger the fluid leakoff, the less driving force is available for fracture growth.
where K is the bulk modulus (ratio of hydrostatic pressure to volumetric strain) of the dry rock material and Ks is the
same measured in a saturated sample.
12
5/9/2014
Required \ Known E, G, E ,G
Shear modulus, G E G G
21
Young's modulus, E E 2G 1 E
E 2G
Poisson ratio,
2G
E 2G
Plane strain modulus, E' 4G 2
1 2 1
4G E
p
Total Stress = Effective Stress + a[Pore Pressure]
Grains Force Pore Fluid
13
5/9/2014
Ground Surface
-500 0
Current Depth , m
-1500 -1000
-2000 -1500
-2500 -2000
-3000 -2500
0 20x106 40x106 60x106 80x106
Stress, Pa
14
5/9/2014
Stress Gradients
Frac gradient
STRESS
oExample:
15
5/9/2014
Fracturing Pressure
Fracture Initiation Pressure or breakdown pressure is the peak value of the pressure appearing
when the formation breaks down and a fracture starts to evolve. Usually it is approximated by
where smin is the minimum horizontal stress, smax is the maximum horizontal stress, T is the tensile
stress of the rock material, a is the poroelasticity constant and po is the pore pressure.
Fracture Propagation Pressure is the stabilized value of the injection pressure for a longer period of
time during which the fracture is evolving.
Detection of formation
breakdown from a step-
rate test
16
5/9/2014
Fracture Closure Pressure. After a fracture calibration treatment, which is carried out without injecting
proppant material, the fracture volume gradually decreases because of leakoff (and also because of
possible back flow, if the injected fluid is flowed back through the well).
Leakoff
Fluid leakoff is controlled by a continuous build-up of a thin layer, or filter cake, which
manifests an ever-increasing resistance to flow through the fracture face.
The leakoff velocity, VL , is given by the Carter equation:
CL
uL
t
Where CL is the leakoff coefficient (length/time0.5) and t is the time elapsed since the
start of the leakoff process. The ideas behind Carter's leakoff coefficient are that:
o if a filter-cake wall is building up, it will allow less fluid to pass through a unit area in unit time;
and,
o the reservoir itself can take less and less fluid if it has been exposed to inflow.
17
5/9/2014
0.006
0.005
AL 0.004
0.003
y = 0.0024 + 0.000069x
0.002
Sp 2CL
0.001
CL
uL 0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
t Square root time, t1/2 (s1/2)
VLost m3
= S p 2CL t CL unit :
m
or
AL s m2 s
units : m mm Sp unit : m
CL
Concept of leakoff coefficient uL
t
m m / s1 / 2
1/ 2
s s
Where are those twos coming from?
Integrated leakoff volume:
VL 2 AC L t
Leakoff Width
VL
wL 2CL t
AL
What is the physical meaning? m mm
18
5/9/2014
Width Equations
Perkins-Kern-Nordgren (PKN) Kristianovich-Zheltov-Geertsma-DeKlerk (KGD)
19
5/9/2014
20
5/9/2014
Types of Fluids
Water-Base Fluids
Oil-Base Fluids
Lease oil and gelled oils.
Acid-Base Fluids
Used in limestones or dolomitic formations.
Emulsions
Mixtures of oil and an aqueous material (either water or acid).
Gas/Foam Fluids
Specialized emulsions using nitrogen or carbon dioxide gas as the inner phase of an aqueous mixture.
21
5/9/2014
Fracturing Additives
Proppant duties:
Be capable of holding the fracture faces apart
22
5/9/2014
Types of Proppants
Manufactured proppants
Sintered Bauxite
23
5/9/2014
Design Logics
24
5/9/2014
Two approximations:
Perkins-Kern-(Nordgren)
Vertical plane strain
Kristianovich-Zheltov - (Gertsmaa-deKlerk)
Horizontal plane strain
Perkins-Kern-Nordgren PKN
width: w, wo, wwell,o qi x f
1/ 4
ww,0 = 3.27
viscosity: E'
w 0.628ww,0
inj. rate (1 wing): qi
half-length: xf Kristianovich-Zheltov
Geertsma-De-Klerk KGD
plain-strain modulus: E' 1/ 4
qi x 2f
ww = 3.22
height: hf E' h
f
Vf = w(h f x f ) w 0.785ww
25
5/9/2014
Vf = w(h f x f ) 2qi
Vf = w A Vi = qi t e
xf
Vfe = Vi - Vlost
Average
w(xf)
qi
A
hf Lost: spurt +leakoff
26
5/9/2014
Proppant schedule:
End-of-pumping concentration is uniform,
mass is the required
Given:
Mass of proppant, target length, frac height, inj rate, rheology, elasticity
modulus, leakoff coeff, max-possible-proppant-added-conc
1. Calculate the wellbore width at the end of pumping from the PKN (Power Law version)
1
n
1 2.14n 2 n 2 2 n 2 qi h f x f 2n2
1 n 1 n 1 n
qi
4. Calculate injected volume t 2 C t (we 2S p ) 0
h x L
f f
V fe h f x f we
e =
Vi Vi
27
5/9/2014
2. Calculate the pad volume and the time needed to pump it V pad Vi
t pad te
M
3. The required max proppant concentration, ce should be (mass/slurry-volume) ce
eVi
t t pad
4. The required proppant concentration (mass/slurry-volume) curve c ce
t t
e pad
c
5. Convert it to added proppant mass to volume of clean fluid cadded
c
1
propp
(mass/clean-fluid-volume)
2qi
Vi = qi te
Vfe = Vi - Vlost
2D design: hf is given
A
hf
rp= hp /hf
28