Application of nanoproppants for fracture conductivity improvement by reducing fluid loss and packing of micro-fractures

Bose, Charles Chempakathinal; Fairchild, Brian; Jones, T.I.; Gul, Awais; Ghahfarokhi, Reza Barati

doi:10.1016/j.jngse.2015.05.019

Cited by 41 publications

(39 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…Advances in Materials Science and Engineering 7 needed for reservoir stimulation [35][36][37]. e simulation of this study suggests that the dip angles of 30°to 60°for parallel jointed rocks can efficiently propagate a main fracture and induce secondary ones to form a complex fracture network.…”

Section: Fracture Propagation Of Parallel Joint Models With Differentmentioning

confidence: 79%

Fracture Propagation Behavior of Jointed Rocks in Hydraulic Fracturing

Men

Han³

2018

Advances in Materials Science and Engineering

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Jointed rocks are typical examples of heterogeneous materials with joints. e existence of joints influences the physical properties of rock mass and propagation of fractures, which can affect production operations in engineering. A series of simulations is performed to understand the failure patterns and fracture propagation behavior of jointed rocks in hydraulic fracturing. ree points, that is, dip-angle joint, joint strength, and complex joints, are considered in the simulations. Results demonstrate three basic kinds of hydraulic fractures on jointed rock, namely, along the joint, across the joint, and partly along the joint and partly across the joint. e maximum principal stress is the control factor of fracture propagation in global scale, and the joint plane is the control factor of fracture propagation in local scale. In the propagation path, when the dip angle is small or the joint is weak, the fracture propagates along the joint; otherwise, the fracture propagates across the joint. In the multijoint interconnection models, hydraulic fractures propagate along joints in the tensile stress regions near the propagating fracture tip without dip angle limitation. Subsequently, the fractures connect with one another to form a complex fracture network based on the joint morphology.

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Section: Fracture Propagation Of Parallel Joint Models With Differentmentioning

confidence: 79%

Fracture Propagation Behavior of Jointed Rocks in Hydraulic Fracturing

Men

Han³

2018

Advances in Materials Science and Engineering

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“…fracturing of tight shale formations [12]. These proppants can create conductivity in the larger generated or existing fractures, but they are not small enough to penetrate into the existing or generated micro-fractures.…”

Section: Hydraulic Fracture Propagation In Unconventional Reservoirsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These proppants can create conductivity in the larger generated or existing fractures, but they are not small enough to penetrate into the existing or generated micro-fractures. This will reduce the length and conductivity of the complex fracture network caused by the closure of micro-fractures at the end of a fracturing job [12]. During fluid injection into the reservoir during hydraulic fracturing, the opening of the natural fractures and the pressure applied inside them decrease as the distance increases from the point of injection [1].…”

Section: Hydraulic Fracture Propagation In Unconventional Reservoirsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Injecting smaller proppants prior to the injection of larger ones may help in sequentially filling the widened natural fractures (widened during injection), allowing deeper percolation of proppants, and thus propping a longer fracture length [26]. Similarly, injecting nano-sized particles which can withstand the closure stress, followed by the conventionally used larger proppants, may help in propping more of the SRV, thereby increasing the seepage area and enhancing production [12,25,26].…”

Section: Fly Ash Nanoparticles As Nano-proppants For Tight Unconventimentioning

confidence: 99%

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Improvement of Hydraulic Fracture Conductivity Using Nanoparticles

Barati¹,

Bose²

2017

Advances in Natural Gas Emerging Technologies

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Hydraulic fracturing is a commonly used practice in the oil industry for well stimulation and production enhancement. With the general theme of the oil and gas industry moving toward systems with nano-sized pores, nanoparticles have gained a significant amount of attention especially in the field of hydraulic fracturing. Several groups have developed different nanoparticle systems that improve hydraulic fracture conductivity. This paper is a review of the highlighted work published in the area of application of nanoparticles to improve fracture conductivity. Nanotechnology can be used to improve the efficiency of hydraulic fracturing process. Four major production challenges faced by the oil and gas industry including incomplete filter cake cleanup, proppant pack damage, formation damage, and having micro-fractures that are not packed with proppants and will close under closure stress are introduced in this work. Solutions have also been reported using the advances in nanotechnology to address some of these challenges.

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“…With the widely application of hydraulic fracturing in horizontal and highly deviated wells, the transportation of formation sand particles and fracturing proppant particles has aroused extensive interest for its great economic benefits and safety problems [5][6][7][8]. The static and dynamic characteristics of particulate matter have attracted a lot of investigations among the researchers because of their numerous applications [9][10][11][12][13][14].The tribological behaviors at the inter-particle contact become a basic research task for the experimental and simulating method to investigate the properties of the particles sliding movement.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%