Cap 5 Ing

Reservoir Stimulation
Contents
Preface: Hydraulic Fracturing, A Technology for All Time

Ahmed S. Abou-Sayed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . P-1
Chapter 1 Reservoir Stimulation in Petroleum Production

Michael J. Economides and Curtis Boney
1-1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-1
1-1.1. Petroleum production . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-1
1-1.2. Units . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-3
1-2. Inflow performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-3
1-2.1. IPR for steady state . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-4
1-2.2. IPR for pseudosteady state. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-5
1-2.3. IPR for transient (or infinite-acting) flow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-5
1-2.4. Horizontal well production . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-6
1-2.5. Permeability anisotropy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-10
1-3. Alterations in the near-wellbore zone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-11
1-3.1. Skin analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-11
1-3.2. Components of the skin effect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-12
1-3.3. Skin effect caused by partial completion and slant . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-12
1-3.4. Perforation skin effect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-13
1-3.5. Hydraulic fracturing in production engineering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-16
1-4. Tubing performance and NODAL* analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-18
1-5. Decision process for well stimulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-20
1-5.1. Stimulation economics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-21
1-5.2. Physical limits to stimulation treatments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-22
1-6. Reservoir engineering considerations for optimal production enhancement strategies . . . . . . . 1-22
1-6.1. Geometry of the well drainage volume . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-23
1-6.2. Well drainage volume characterizations and production optimization strategies . . . . 1-24
1-7. Stimulation execution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-28
1-7.1. Matrix stimulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-28
1-7.2. Hydraulic fracturing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-18
Chapter 2 Formation Characterization: Well and Reservoir Testing

Christine A. Ehlig-Economides and Michael J. Economides
2-1. Evolution of a technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-1
2-1.1. Horner semilogarithmic analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-1
2-1.2. Log-log plot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-2
2-2. Pressure derivative in well test diagnosis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-3
2-3. Parameter estimation from pressure transient data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-7
2-3.1. Radial flow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-7
2-3.2. Linear flow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-9
Reservoir Stimulation v
elgoajiroblanco@hotmail.com

Basics of
Hydraulic Fracturing
M. B. Smith, NSI Technologies, Inc.
J. W. Shlyapobersky, Shell E&P Technology Co.
5-1. Introduction treatment (see Chapters 7 and 8). However, the

design must also be consistent with the physical
Since its introduction, hydraulic fracturing has been, limits set by actual field and well environments.
and will remain, one of the primary engineering Also, treatments must be conducted as designed to
tools for improving well productivity. This is achieve a desired result (i.e., full circle to the critical
achieved by role of operations). Proper treatment design is thus
placing a conductive channel through near- tied to several disciplines:
wellbore damage, bypassing this crucial zone production engineering
extending the channel to a significant depth into rock mechanics
the reservoir to further increase productivity
fluid mechanics
placing the channel such that fluid flow in the
selection of optimum materials
reservoir is altered.
operations.
In this last instance, the fracture becomes a tool
for true reservoir management including sand Because of this absolutely essential multidiscipli-
deconsolidation management and long-term nary approach, there is only one rule of thumb in frac-
exploitation strategies. As first visualized (see the turing: that there are no rules of thumb in fracturing.
Appendix to this chapter), the concept of hydraulic The multidisciplinary nature, along with the diffi-
fracturing was quite straightforward. This visual- culty in firmly establishing many of the design vari-
ization is described in the following, and in general, ables, lends an element of art to hydraulic fracturing.
for reasonably simple geology, the basic physics of This is not to say that the process is a mystery nor
fracturing is straightforward and well established. is it to say that for most cases the basic physics con-
Complexity arises from two directions: geologic trolling the process is not defined (see Chapter 6). It
reality and the inherent multidisciplinary nature of simply says that the multitude of variables involved,
the fracturing process. along with some uncertainty in the absolute values
Historically, the control of fracturing has rested of these variables, makes sound engineering judg-
with drilling and operations groups owing to the ment important.
nature of field procedures using pumps, packers,
pressure limits, etc. However, the final results (and
thus design) are dominantly a production engineer-
5-1.1. What is fracturing?
ing exercise, and fracturing cannot be removed from If fluid is pumped into a well faster than the fluid
intimate contact with reservoir engineering. At the can escape into the formation, inevitably pressure
same time, designing a treatment to achieve the rises, and at some point something breaks. Because
desired results is also intimately connected with rock rock is generally weaker than steel, what breaks is
mechanics (which controls fracture geometry; see usually the formation, resulting in the wellbore
Chapters 3 and 4), fluid mechanics (which controls splitting along its axis as a result of tensile hoop
fluid flow and proppant placement inside a fracture; stresses generated by the internal pressure. The
see Chapter 6) and the chemistry that governs the mechanics of this process are described in Section
performance of the materials used to conduct the 3-5.7, and the simple idea of the wellbore splitting
like a pipe (shown as a cartoon in Fig. 5-1) becomes
Deceased more complex for cased and/or perforated wells and
Reservoir Stimulation 5-1
2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

PARA COMPRAR AL DETAL O AL MAYOR, ESTE Y OTROS PRODUCTOS, FAVOR PREGUNTAR POR EL GAJIRO BLANCO, EN EL MERCADO LAS PLAYITAS.
ADVERTENCIA: "EL DERECHO DE AUTOR NO ES UNA FORMA DE PROPIEDAD SINO UN DERECHO CULTURAL. EXIGE TU DERECHO"
Figure 5-1. Internal pressure breaking a vertical wellbore. Figure 5-2. Cross-sectional view of a propagating fracture.
nonvertical wells. However, in general, the wellbore open and maintain a conductive flow path for the
breaksi.e., the rock fracturesowing to the action increased formation flow area during production.
of the hydraulic fluid pressure, and a hydraulic The propping agent is generally sand or a high-
fracture is created. Because most wells are vertical strength, granular substitute for sand (see Section 7-7).
and the smallest stress is the minimum horizontal Alternatively, for carbonate rocks, the hydraulic fluid
stress, the initial splitting (or breakdown) results in may consist of acid that dissolves some of the forma-
a vertical, planar parting in the earth. tion, leaving behind acid-etched channels extending
The breakdown and early fracture growth expose into the reservoir.
new formation area to the injected fluid, and thus the After the breakdown, the fracture propagation rate
rate of fluid leaking off into the formation starts to and fluid flow rate inside the fracture become impor-
increase. However, if the pumping rate is maintained tant. They are dominated by fluid-loss behavior. As
at a rate higher than the fluid-loss rate, then the introduced by Carter (1957) and discussed in the fol-
newly created fracture must continue to propagate lowing (and in Chapters 6 and 9), the fluid-loss rate
and grow (Fig. 5-2). This growth continues to open qL from a fracture can be expressed as
more formation area. However, although the
hydraulic fracture tremendously increases the forma- 2 CL A
qL , (5-1)
tion flow area while pumping, once pumping stops t
and the injected fluids leak off, the fracture will close
and the new formation area will not be available for where CL is the fluid-loss coefficient, A is an element
production. To prevent this, measures must be taken of the fracture area (i.e., increased inflow area), t is
to maintain the conductive channel. This normally time measured from the start of pumping, and is
involves adding a propping agent to the hydraulic the time when each small area element of a fracture
fluid to be transported into the fracture. When pump- is created or opened. As a direct consequence of this
ing stops and fluid flows back from the well, the relation, the highest rate of fluid loss is always at the
propping agent remains in place to keep the fracture fracture tip. Newly created fracture area exists at that
5-2 Basics of Hydraulic Fracturing

point (t = 0 in the denominator), making qL in- Thus, proppant concentration (i.e., volume fraction
stantly infinite. of solid proppant) increases as the slurry stages dehy-
Initially, fracture penetration is limited, and hence drate. The pump schedule, or proppant addition
fluid loss is high near the wellbore. For that reason, schedule, must be engineered much like handicapping
the first part of a hydraulic fracture treatment con- horse races, but with no single winner. Rather, all
sists of fluid only (no proppant); this is termed the stages should finish at the right place, at the right
pad. The purpose of a pad is to break down the well- time, with the right final proppant concentration. The
bore and initiate the fracture. Also, the pad provides pad should be completely lost to the formation, and
fluid to produce sufficient penetration and width to the first proppant stage should be right at the fracture
allow proppant-laden fluid stages to later enter the tip (which should be at the design length).
fracture and thus avoid high fluid loss near the frac- As the proppant slurry stages move down the frac-
ture tip. After the pad, proppant-laden stages are ture, they dehydrate and concentrate. Slurry stages
pumped to transport propping agent into the fracture. pumped later in the treatment are pumped at a higher
This chapter describes the process for propped frac- concentration. These stages are not in the fracture for
ture treatments; acid fracture treatments are dis- long prior to the treatment end (i.e., prior to shut-
cussed in Section 10-6. down) and are thus exposed to less fluid loss and less
However, because fluid loss to the formation is still dehydration. Ideally, the first proppant stage pumped
occurring, even near the well, the first proppant is reaches the fracture tip just as the last of the pad
added to the fluid at low concentrations. The prop- fluid is lost into the formation (a correctly handi-
pant-laden slurry enters the fracture at the well and capped race), and this first stage has concentrated
flows toward the fracture tip (Fig. 5-3). At this point, from its low concentration to some preselected,
two phenomena begin. First, because of the higher higher final design concentration. Meanwhile, the
fluid loss at the fracture tip, slurry flows through the slurry concentration being pumped is steadily
fracture faster than the tip propagates, and the prop- increased to the same final design concentration.
;
pant-laden slurry eventually overtakes the fracture tip. At treatment end, the entire fracture is filled with the
Next, because of fluid loss, the proppant-laden slurry design concentration slurry. Design considerations
stages lose fluid (but not proppant) to the formation. for the final concentration are discussed later in this
section and in detail in Section 10-4.
The preceding description might be termed a nor-
;; ;;
; ;
mal design, where the entire fracture is filled with a
uniform, preselected, design proppant concentration
just as the treatment ends. If pumping continues past
that point, there would be little additional fracture
extension because the pad is 100% depleted. Con-
tinued pumping forces the fracture to become wider
;;;;;;
(and forces the pressure to increase) because the
increased volume simply acts like blowing up a bal-
loon. In some cases the additional propped width
that results may be desirable, and this procedure is
used purposely. This is termed tip-screenout (TSO)
fracturing.
At the conclusion of the treatment, the final flush
stage is pumped. This segment of a treatment con-
sists of one wellbore volume of fluid only and is
intended to sweep the wellbore clean of proppant
(Fig. 5-4). The well is generally then shut-in for
some period to allow fluid to leak off such that the
fracture closes on and stresses the proppant pack.
Shut-in also allows temperature (and chemical
Figure 5-3. Introducing proppant into the fracture. breakers added to the fluid while pumping) to reduce

are addressed separately in this section, they fre-

quently overlap.
;;;
;
Damage bypass
Near-wellbore damage reduces well productivity.
This damage can occur from several sources,
including drilling-induced damage resulting from
fines invasion into the formation while drilling
;;;
;
and chemical incompatibility between drilling flu-
ids and the formation. The damage can also be
due to natural reservoir processes such as satura-
tion changes resulting from low reservoir pressure
near a well, formation fines movement or scale
deposition. Whatever the cause, the result is unde-
sirable. Matrix treatments (discussed in Chapters
13 through 20) are usually used to remove the
damage chemically, restoring a well to its natural
productivity. In some instances, chemical proce-
dures may not be effective or appropriate, and
hydraulic fracture operations are used to bypass
the damage. This is achieved by producing a high-
conductivity path through the damage region to
Figure 5-4. Flushing the wellbore to leave a propped frac- restore wellbore contact with undamaged rock.
ture. Improved productivity
the viscosity of the fracturing fluid (see Section 7-6.2). Unlike matrix stimulation procedures, hydraulic
Ideally, this process leaves a proppant-filled fracture fracturing operations can extend a conductive
with a productive fracture length (or half-length xf), channel deep into the reservoir and actually stimu-
propped fracture height and propped fracture width late productivity beyond the natural level.
(which determines the fracture conductivity kfw). All reservoir exploitation practices are subject
Here, xf is the productive fracture half-length, which to Darcys law:
may be less than the created half-length L or less kh p A
than the propped length. q , (5-2)
x h
5-1.2. Why fracture? where the all-important production rate q is relat-

ed to formation permeability k, pay thickness h,
Hydraulic fracture operations may be performed on a
reservoir fluid viscosity , pressure drop p and
well for one (or more) of three reasons:
formation flow area A. Reservoir exploitation
to bypass near-wellbore damage and return a well revolves around manipulating this equation. For
to its natural productivity example, pressure drop may be increased by using
to extend a conductive path deep into a formation artificial lift to reduce bottomhole flowing pres-
and thus increase productivity beyond the natural sure, water injection to increase or maintain reser-
level voir pressure, or both. For other cases, in-situ
to alter fluid flow in the formation. combustion or steam injection is used to reduce
reservoir fluid viscosity and thus increase produc-
In the third case, fracture design may affect and tivity. For fracturing, as pictured in Fig. 5-5, oper-
be affected by considerations for other wells (e.g., ations are on the formation area in the equation,
where to place other wells and how many additional with the increased formation flow area giving the
wells to drill). The fracture becomes a tool for reser- increased production rate and increased present
voir management. Although these three motivations value for the reserves. (Strictly speaking, it is the

accelerating production from a single well to reser-

voir management, occurred with the application of
;;;
;;
;;
; ;
massive stimulation treatments in tight gas forma-
tions (see Appendix to this chapter). Although out-
wardly a traditional application of fracturing to
poorer quality reservoirs, these treatments repre-
sented the first engineering attempts to alter reser-
;;;
;;
voir flow in the horizontal plane and the methodol-
ogy for well placement (e.g., Smith, 1979).
Fracturing for vertical inflow conformance (i.e.,
reservoir management) was successfully used in
the Gullfaks field (Bale et al., 1994), where selec-
tive perforating and fracturing were used to opti-
mize reserve recovery and control sand production
while maintaining (but not necessarily increasing)
the required production rates. This is illustrated in
Fig. 5-6, where the bottom, low-permeability
Rannoch-1 zone was perforated to create a
propped fracture that extends up and into the
high-permeability (>1000-md) Rannoch-3 zone.
Without fracturing, the entire zone can be perfo-
rated, and a low drawdown allows a significant
production rate on the order of 20,000 STB/D,
Figure 5-5. Increased flow area resulting from a fracture. sand free. However, sand production is triggered
by water breakthrough in the high-permeability
flow shape that is altered, as discussed in detail in zone (from downdip water injection). The result-
Chapter 1.) ing wellbore enlargement caused by sand produc-
tion acts to stimulate production from the high-
This is the classic use of fracturing, to increase permeability zone. To stop sand production, draw-
the producing rate by bypassing near-wellbore
formation damage or by increasing exposure of
the formation area and thus stimulating well per- Stress (psi)
formance beyond that for no damage. For a single 4500 5500
well, treatment design concentrates on creating Rannoch-3
1820
the required formation flow area to yield increased
production at minimal cost. More formally, the Rannoch-3
design should optimize economic return on the
1840
basis of increased productivity and treatment cost. Rannoch-3
Reservoir management
Along with improving well productivity, fractures Rannoch-2
1860
also provide a powerful tool for altering reservoir
flow. In combination with the other parts of field Rannoch-1
development, the fracture becomes a reservoir
management tool. For example, creating long 1880
fractures in tight rock (k < 0.1 md) enables field
development with fewer wells. However, even 0 20 40 60 80
fewer wells are required if the fracture azimuth TVD Fracture penetration (m)
(m below
is known and the wells are located appropriately sea level)
(e.g., not on a regulatory-required square pattern).
The actual philosophy shift for fracturing, from Figure 5-6. Fracturing for vertical inflow conformance.

down must be reduced even more. The production (as compared with a simple completion in which
is then essentially 100% water coming from the the entire zone is perforated).
stimulated high-permeability zone, and the well Another example of reservoir management is
must be abandoned. This further diminishes pro- waterflood development utilizing fractures and a
duction from the large reserves found in the line drive flood pattern (i.e., one-dimensional
deeper zones with lower permeability. [1D] or linear flow from injection fractures to pro-
Open- or cased hole gravel packing could be duction fractures). Knowledge of the fracture
used to eliminate the sand production. However, azimuth, combined with conductive fractures (or
such completions are less than satisfactory for two correctly controlled injection greater than the frac-
reasons. First, the deeper, lower permeability ture pressure) results in improved sweep efficiency
zones can significantly benefit from stimulation. and enables more efficient field development.
Second, significant scaling occurs with water
breakthrough and quickly plugs the gravel pack.
The fracturing tool selected to manage the 5-1.3. Design considerations and
Gullfaks field is termed an indirect vertical frac- primary variables
ture completion (IVFC). The IVFC accomplishes This section introduces the primary variables for frac-
several goals: ture design. Sidebar 5A summarizes how the design
Some (although choked) production is achieved variables originate from treatment design goals.
from the main zone to enable the well to reach As mentioned previously, fracturing was con-
minimum productivity standards. trolled historically by operational considerations.
Production from the lower, moderate-perme- This limited its application because fracturing is
ability zone is stimulated, maximizing reserves dominantly a reservoir process, and hence why a
from this zone. reservoir is fractured and what type of fracture is
Greater drawdown is allowed because the weak required should be dominated by reservoir engineer-
high-permeability rock is separated from the ing considerations. The permeability k becomes the
perforations, and greater drawdown increases primary reservoir variable for fracturing and all
the total rate and significantly increases recov- reservoir considerations. Other, so-called normal
ery from the lower zones. reservoir parameters such as net pay and porosity
dominate the economics and control the ultimate
If the upper high-permeability zone has sand viability of a project but do not directly impact how
production tendencies (as is typically the case), the fracturing tool is employed. As discussed in
then producing this zone via the fracture totally Chapter 12, postfracture productivity is also gov-
avoids the need for sand control. erned by a combination of the fracture conductivity
Any potential for water breakthrough in the kf w and xf, where kf is the permeability of the prop-
high-permeability zone is retarded, and post- pant in the fracture, w is the propped fracture width,
water-breakthrough oil production is signifi- and xf is the fracture penetration or half-length.
cantly increased. These variables are controlled by fracturing and
To achieve these goals, fracture conductivity therefore identify the goals for treatment design.
must be tailored by synergy between the reservoir The productive fracture half-length xf may be less
and fracture models. Too much conductivity than the created (or the created and propped) half-
accelerates production and the time to water length L because of many factors (see Section 12-3).
breakthrough from the high-permeability main For example, the fracture width near the tip of a
zone. Also, too much conductivity, because of fracture may be too narrow to allow adequate
surface or tubular limits for the production rate, propped width. As another example, vertical varia-
restricts drawdown on the lower zones, and the tions in formation permeability, or layering, can
desired, more uniform vertical production profile cause the apparent productive length xf to be less
is not achieved. The fracture design goal is not to than the actual propped length (Bennett et al., 1986).
simply accelerate the rate but to achieve maxi- Similarly, this also makes the fracture height hf
mum reserves recovery with no sacrifice of rate important in several ways (Fig. 5-7):

5A. Design goals and variables
This discussion briefly summarizes the design goals of hydraulic fracturing that provide a road map for the major design variables.
Design goals
Design goals result from Darcys law (Eq. 5-2), in which the dimensionless term A/(xh) is defined by flow conditions and equals
ln(re /rw ) for steady-state flow (as discussed in Chapter 1). For steady-state flow, Prats (1961) showed that a fracture affects produc-
tivity through the equivalent wellbore radius rw and that rw is related to the fracture half-length or penetration xf by the dimension-
less fracture conductivity (CfD = kfw/kxf). Cinco-Ley et al. (1978) extended these concepts for transient flow with the relation among
xf, rw and CfD shown in Fig. 5-11 for pseudoradial flow (where the pressure-depletion region >> xf but is not affected by external
boundaries). Thus, the primary design goals are fracture half-length or penetration and the fracture conductivity kfw, with their rela-
tive values defined by CfD.
Design variables
Design variables result from material balance, rock mechanics and fluid mechanics considerations.
The material balance is (Eqs. 5-10 through 5-12)
Vf = Vi VLp ; Vf = 2Lhf w , Vi = q i t p and VLp 6CLhLL t p + 4LhLS p , (5A-1)
where CL and Sp are fluid-loss parameters that can be determined by the results of a fluid-loss test (Fig. 5A-1) for which the filtrate
volume divided by the exposed area VL /A = Sp + 2CLt . Combining the relations in Eq. 5A-1 gives Eq. 5-13:
q it p
L ,
6CLhL t p + 4hLS p + 2whf
where fracture penetration L is related to pump rate, fluid loss, height, width, etc.
Next is the elasticity equation (Eq. 5-14):
2p net d
w max = ,
E'
where pnet = pf c, and width is related to net pressure as a function of modulus and geometry and the pressure required to propa-
gate the fracture (Eq. 5-21):
p tip = (p c ) at tip K Ic apparent 1 / d , (5A-2)
where d is the characteristic fracture dimension and generally is the smaller dimension between hf and L.
Third is the fluid flow equation (Eqs. 5-15 through 5-19), in which Eq. 5-15 (dpnet /dx = 12q/hfw3) is combined with the width equation:
1/ 4
E' 3
p net 4 {q i L} + p net
4
tip
, (5A-3)
hf
where the pressure drop down the fracture is related to viscosity, pump rate, fracture length (and thus to fluid loss), etc. The net
pressure distribution gives the fracture width distribution and thus the final propped fracture width (i.e., kfw). Hence the primary
design variables are CL, hL, Sp, hf, E , KIc-apparent, qi , and c .
Optimum design
The optimum design results from maximizing
Volume lost/area, VL /A
revenue $(rw) minus the costs $(xf, kfw) by

using the preferred economic criteria.
2Cw
Sp
Figure 5A-1. Ideal laboratory fluid-loss data for spurt

loss Sp and the wall-building or filter-cake fluid-loss
coefficient Cw. If the total fluid loss is dominated by the time
filter cake, then the total fluid-loss coefficient CL = Cw.

(a) rock mechanics considerations are related to the net

pressure pnet:
pnet = p f c , (5-3)
Oil where pf is the pressure inside the fracture and c is the
minimum in-situ stress (or fracture closure pressure).
For an ideal, homogeneous zone, closure pressure
is synonymous with the minimum in-situ stress.
However, such ideal conditions do not exist. Stress
(b) is a point value, and stress varies from point to point.
For realistic in-situ conditions, closure pressure
reflects the pressure where the fracture is grossly
closed, although the pressure may still be greater
Oil than the minimum in-situ stress at some points. For
zones that are only slightly nonhomogeneous, the
closure pressure represents a zone-averaged stress
over the fracture. However, other conditions may be
more complex. Consider the three-layer case of two
low-stress sandstone intervals with a thick interbed-
(c) ded shale. The correct closure pressure may be the
zone-averaged stress over the two low-stress zones,
without including the higher stress interbedded zone.
The fracture width is also of major importance for
Oil
achieving the desired design goals. Typically, this is
expressed as the product of fracture permeability
times fracture width; i.e., kf w is the dimensional con-
ductivity of the fracture. Figure 5-8 is an ideal well-
Water
bore/fracture connection for a propped fracture that
is intended to bypass near-wellbore formation dam-
age. To achieve the desired production goals, a nar-
Figure 5-7. The importance of fracture height.
row fracture must, at a minimum, carry the flow that
In Fig. 5-7a, the fracture is initiated near the top

of the interval, and hf is not large enough to con-
tact the entire zone, which is clearly an important
reservoir concern.
In Fig. 5-7b, the fracture grew out of the zone and
contacted mostly nonreservoir rock, diminishing xf rw
relative to the treatment volume pumped.
In Fig. 5-7c, the fracture grew downward past the
oil/water contact and if propped would possibly
result in unacceptable water production.
In all these cases, as discussed in Section 5-4.2,
fracture height growth is controlled by rock mechan-
ics considerations such as in-situ stress, stress gradi-
ents, stress magnitude differences between different
geologic layers and differences in strength or frac- Figure 5-8. An ideal wellbore/fracture connection for a
ture toughness between different layers. All these propped fracture that is intended to bypass near-wellbore
formation damage.

would have been produced through the entire well- that many of these interactions will be contradictory
bore circumference (had there been no damage). The or incompatible. This is discussed later, but an exam-
fracture conductivity kf w must be greater than 2rwk, ple is as follows. Consider a case where reservoir
where rw is the wellbore radius. For higher perme- goals require a long fracture. With deep penetration
ability formations that can deliver high rates with into the pay zone, getting good proppant transport
sufficient fracture permeability, fracture width and down a long fracture clearly requires high fluid vis-
any variables that affect width become important. As cosity. However, high viscosity increases the net
discussed in the following and in Section 6-2, width pressure inside the fracture. This reacts with the
is controlled by the fracture dimensions (hf and L), stress difference between the pay and the overlying
net pressure inside the fracture acting to open and and underlying shales and causes height growth,
propagate the fracture, and another property, the resulting in less penetration than desired, and thus
modulus or stiffness of the rock. less viscosity is required.
As implied by the term hydraulic fracturing, fluid Inherent contradictions controlling fluid selection
mechanics is an important element in fracturing. The abound:
two dominant fluid mechanics variables, injection
Good viscosity is required to provide good prop-
(pump) rate qi and fluid viscosity , affect net pres-
pant transport, but minimal pipe friction is also
sure inside the fracture (and thus width) and largely
desirable to reduce surface pump pressure.
control transport and the final placement of proppant
in the fracture. These variables also have a role in The fluid system is expected to control fluid loss,
controlling the volume of fluid lost to the formation but without damage to the formation or fracture
during pumping. For example, high pump rates permeability.
reduce the total fluid loss because for a given volume Performance at high temperature, for long periods
pumped there is less time for fluid loss to occur. of time, is required from a fluid system that does
Another key factor of a good design is selection not cost much.
of the fluid and proppant systems with performance
characteristics (e.g., , CL, kf) that best meet the
requirements for the fracture treatment (i.e., material 5-2. In-situ stress
selection). In addition, the performance variables for In-situ stress, in particular the minimum in-situ stress
the materials must be properly characterized. Fluids (termed the fracture closure pressure for nonhomoge-
and proppants are addressed in Chapter 7, and their neous zones, as discussed earlier) is the dominant
performance is discussed in Chapter 8. parameter controlling fracture geometry. It is dis-
Finally, all the design parameters must be molded cussed in detail in Chapter 3. For relaxed geologic
to be compatible with existing well conditions (i.e., environments, the minimum in-situ stress is gener-
operational considerations). For example, it does lit- ally horizontal; thus a vertical fracture that formed
tle good to complain that the detailed design and when a vertical wellbore broke remains vertical and
analysis done in planning a treatment for an existing is perpendicular to this minimum stress. Hydraulic
well call for a high pump rate of 60 bbl/min when fractures are always perpendicular to the minimum
the wellbore conditions limit the maximum allow- stress, except in some complex cases, and even for
able pump rate to one-half that rate. Clearly, for new those cases any significant departure is only at the
wells the operational considerations (detailed in well. This occurs simply because that is the least
Chapter 11) should be an integral part of planning resistant path. Opening a fracture in any other direc-
for the drilling and completion process (e.g., well tion requires higher pressure and more energy.
trajectory for extended reach wells) (Martins et al., The minimum stress controls many aspects of
1992c). fracturing:
At very shallow depths or under unusual condi-
5-1.4. Variable interaction tions of tectonic stress and/or high reservoir pres-
sure, the weight of the overburden may be the
It is clear that with major design considerations com-
minimum stress and the orientation of the
ing from multiple disciplines, the variables will
hydraulic fractures will be horizontal; for more
react, interact and interconnect in multiple ways and

normal cases, the minimum stress is generally hor- sure, the closure stress is typically between 0.6 and
izontal and the maximum horizontal stress direc- 0.7 psi/ft of depth (true vertical depth, TVD). More
tion determines whether the vertical fracture will generally, as discussed in Chapter 3, the minimum
run northsouth, eastwest, etc. stress is related to depth and reservoir pressure by
c Ko ( v pr ) + pr + T ,
Stress differences between different geologic lay-
(5-4)
ers are the primary control over the important
parameter of height growth (Fig. 5-9). where Ko is a proportionality constant related to the
Through its magnitude, the stress has a large bear- rock properties of the formations (possibly to both
ing on material requirements, pumping equipment, the elastic properties and the faulting or failure prop-
etc., required for a treatment. Because the bottom- erties), v is the vertical stress from the weight of
hole pressure must exceed the in-situ stress for the overburden, pr is the reservoir pore pressure, and
fracture propagation, stress controls the required T accounts for any tectonic effects on the stress (for
pumping pressure that well tubulars must with- a relaxed, normal fault geology, T is typically small).
stand and also controls the hydraulic horsepower Ko is typically about 13. For fracture design, better
(hhp) required for the treatment. After fracturing, values are required than can be provided by such a
high stresses tend to crush the proppant and reduce simple relation, and methods of measuring or infer-
kf ; thus, the stress magnitude dominates the selec- ring the in-situ stress are discussed in Chapters 3 and
tion of proppant type and largely controls postfrac- 4. For preliminary design and evaluation, using
ture conductivity. Eq. 5-4 with Ko = 13 is usually sufficient.
Therefore, the detailed design of hydraulic fracture
treatments requires detailed information on in-situ 5-3. Reservoir engineering
stresses. An engineer must know the magnitude of
the minimum in-situ stress for the pay zone and As previously mentioned, because the ultimate goal
over- and underlying zones and in some cases must of fracturing is to alter fluid flow in a reservoir,
know the direction for the three principal stresses. reservoir engineering must provide the goals for a
For a simple, relaxed geology with normal pore pres- design. In addition, reservoir variables may impact
the fluid loss.
(a) (b) (c)

v
h
0.9
0.8
0.7
0.6
pnet/
Shale 0.5
pnet
hf hfo 0.4
3 4 H 0.3
2
0.2
0.1
0
1 1 2 3
h f /h fo
Shale
Figure 5-9. Fracture height growth. (a) Idealized fracture profile of the relation of fracture geometry to in-situ stresses.
h = minimum horizontal stress, H = maximum horizontal stress. (b) Typical fracture vertical cross section illustrating the
relation of the total fracture height hf to the original fracture height hfo. (c) Theoretical relation among hf /hfo, pnet and the
in-situ stress difference (Simonson et al., 1978).

5-3.1. Design goals fracture and also assumes infinite conductivity. Prats
correctly accounted for the pressure distribution
Historically, the emphasis in fracturing low-perme- around a fracture and provided a general relation
ability reservoirs was on the productive fracture between dimensionless conductivity and rw for
length xf. For higher permeability reservoirs, the con- steady-state conditions (see Chapter 1). The relation
ductivity kfw is equally or more important, and the shows that for infinite-conductivity fractures, the
two are balanced by the formation permeability k. upper limit on rw is slightly less than that from the
This critical balance was first discussed by Prats flow area balance in Eq. 5-6. For infinite kfw, Prats
(1961), more than 10 years after the introduction of found
fracturing, with the important concept of dimension-
less fracture conductivity CfD: rw = 0.5 x f . (5-7)
kw
C fD = f . (5-5)
k xf Cinco-Ley et al. (1978) later integrated this into a
This dimensionless conductivity is the ratio of the full description of reservoir response, including tran-
ability of the fracture to carry flow divided by the
ability of the formation to feed the fracture. In gen- 5B. Highway analogy for dimensionless
eral, these two production characteristics should be fracture conductivity
in balance. In fact, for a fixed volume of proppant,
maximum production is achieved for a value of CfD A simplistic analogy for dimensionless fracture conductivity
CfD is a highway system. The numerator of this dimension-
between 1 and 2, as discussed in Chapters 1 and 10, less variable is kfw, which is the capacity of the highway or
with an analogy to highway design in Sidebar 5B. the ability of the highway to carry traffic. The denominator is
kxf ; this is the ability of the feeder roads to supply traffic to
Prats also introduced another critical concept, the the highway.
idea of the effective wellbore radius rw. As shown in The famous old U.S. highway known as Route 66 ran, for
much of its length, across sparsely populated areas where
Fig. 5-10, a simple balancing of flow areas between feeder roads were few, narrow and far between. The ability
a wellbore and a fracture gives the equivalent value of the feeder road network to supply traffic to the highway
was limited (similar to the conditions existing when a prop-
of rw for a propped fracture (qualitative relation ped hydraulic fracture is placed in a formation with very low
only): permeability). In this case, the width, or flow capacity, of the
highway is not an issue (kfw does not have to be large).
2 What is needed (and was eventually built) is a long, narrow
rw xf . (5-6) (low-conductivity) highway.
As a comparison, consider Loop 610, the superhighway
surrounding the city of Houston. The feeder system is locat-
However, this simple flow area equivalence ed in a densely populated area, and the feeder roads are
ignores the altered pore pressure field around a linear numerous and wide. Here, the width, or flow capacity, of the
highway is critical. Making this highway longer has no effect
;;;
on traffic flow, and the only way to increase traffic flow is to
widen (i.e., increase the conductivity of) the road. This is
obviously analogous to placing a fracture in a higher perme-
. . Flow area = 2rwh
. .. . .. . .. . . ability formation, with the postfracture production limited by
.. .. .... . . . .. .. . . .. . the fracture width (or, more accurately, limited by kfw).
. .. . ..
. .. . .. . .. .. .. .. . If CfD is the ratio of the ability of a highway to carry traffic
. . .. . .. .. .. ... . .. .. . to the ability of the feeder system to supply that traffic to the
. . . . .. . .
highway, clearly a highway should be engineered to approxi-
mately balance these conditions. That is, a CfD value > 50 is
;;;
seldom warranted, because a highway would not be con-
structed to carry 50 times more traffic than the feeder system
Flow area = could supply. In the same way, a value of 0.1 makes little
2rwh 2
rw = x sense. Why construct a highway that can only carry 10% of
f
the available traffic? In general, an ideal value for CfD would
be expected to be about 1 to result in a balanced, well-
engineered highway system.
A balance of about 1 is certainly attractive for steady-flow
traffic conditions that may exist through most of the day.
Flow area = 4xfh However, during peak traffic periods the feeder system may
supply more traffic than normal, and if this rush hour or tran-
sient traffic period is a major consideration, then a larger ratio
of CfD may be desirable. Thus, a CfD of 10 may be desirable
for peak flow (transient) periods, as opposed to a CfD value of
approximately 1 for steady-state traffic conditions.
Figure 5-10. Equivalent wellbore radius rw.

sient flow. For pseudoradial flow, Cinco-Ley et al. ex- 5-3.2. Complicating factors
pressed rw as a function of length and CfD (Fig. 5-11).
The chart in Fig. 5-11 (equivalent to Prats) can be These principal concepts give a straightforward
used (when pseudoradial flow is appropriate) as a method for predicting postfracture production; how-
powerful reservoir engineering tool to assess possi- ever, complications can reduce postfracture produc-
ble postfracture productivity benefits from propped tivity below the levels expected or give better pro-
fracturing. For example, the folds of increase (FOI) ductivity than that calculated. The major complica-
for steady-state flow can be defined as the postfrac- tions include non-Darcy (or turbulent) flow, transient
ture increase in well productivity compared with flow regimes, layered reservoirs and horizontal per-
prefracture productivity calculated from meability anisotropy (particularly any natural fissure
permeability).
ln (re / rw ) + s For high-rate wells, non-Darcy or turbulent flow
FOI = , (5-8)
ln (re / rw ) can be an important factor that causes an increased
pressure drop along the fracture. This creates an
where re is the well drainage or reservoir radius, rw apparent conductivity that is less than the equivalent
is the normal wellbore radius, and s is any prefrac- laminar flow conductivity. The apparent CfD is also
ture skin effect resulting from wellbore damage, reduced and productivity is less than that expected.
scale buildup, etc. An equivalent skin effect sf result- Another complicating effect that can reduce produc-
ing from a fracture is tivity from expected levels is formation layering,
s f = ln (rw / rw ) (5-9) where a fracture is in multiple layers with signifi-
cantly different values for porosity, permeability or
for use in reservoir models or other productivity cal- both. Unlike radial flow into a wellbore, average val-
culations. Equation 5-8 provides the long-term FOI. ues of permeability and porosity do not apply, and
Many wells, particularly in low-permeability reser- for layered formations, postfracture performance
voirs, may exhibit much higher (but declining) early- falls below simple calculations based on average per-
time, transient FOI. The preceding relations are for meability (Bennett et al., 1986). These and other
transient pseudoradial flow before any reservoir effects are discussed in Section 12-3.
boundary effects; the case for boundary effects is For lower permeability formations and for some
discussed in Section 12-2.6. time period, postfracture performance is dominated
by transient flow (also called flush production) as
discussed by Cinco-Ley et al. (1978). For transient
conditions, reservoir flow has not developed into
0.5 pseudoradial flow patterns, and the simple rw rela-
tions are not applicable. In the example in Fig. 5-12,
Effective well radius rw
CfD > 30, xf limited

Fracture half-length xf
0.2 rw = xf/2
pseudoradial flow did not develop until about 48
,
0.1 months. During the prior transient flow regimes,

0.05
8000 Gas well
CfD < 0.5, kfw limited
0.02 rw = 0.28 kfw/k 5000 k = 0.1 md, xf = 1000 ft
Numerical h = 50 ft, kfw = 200 md-ft
0.01 model
0.1 0.2 0.5 1 2 5 10 20 50 2000
Rate (Mcf/D)
Dimensionless fracture conductivity, CfD

1000 Radial flow
FOI = 3.9
Figure 5-11. Equivalent wellbore radius as a function of 500
dimensionless fracture conductivity and fracture length.
Radial flow
200
100
12 24 36 48 60 72 84 96 108
Time (months)
Figure 5-12. Late development of pseudoradial flow.

productivity was better than that predicted from the where qi is the total injection rate and tp is the pump-
pseudoradial flow rw. The duration of the transient ing time for a treatment. Equally simple, the fracture
flow period is a function of permeability, CfD and xf 2 volume created during a treatment can be idealized
such that for moderate- to high-permeability wells as
the period is too short to have practical significance
for fracture design. However, it may be important for Vf = h f w 2 L = Vi , (5-11)
postfracture well test analysis. For low-permeability
wells with long fractures, transient flow may domi- where hf is an average, gross fracture height, w is the
nate most of the productive well life. average fracture width, L is the fracture half-length
or penetration, and is the fluid efficiency. Finally,
as discussed by Harrington et al. (1973) and Nolte
5-3.3. Reservoir effects on fluid loss (1979), the volume lost while a hydraulic fracture
treatment is being pumped can be approximated by
Reservoir properties such as permeability to reservoir
fluid, relative permeability to the fracturing fluid fil-
trate, total system compressibility, porosity, reservoir VLp 6CL hL L t p + 4 LhL Sp , (5-12)
fluid viscosity and reservoir pressure all play a role in
where CL is the fluid-loss coefficient (typically from
fluid loss while pumping (see Section 6-4). Thus, cer-
0.0005 to 0.05 ft/min1/2), hL is the permeable or
tain reservoir information is required for treatment
fluid-loss height, and Sp is the spurt loss (typically
design, as well as for specifying design goals.
from 0 to 50 gal/100 ft2). Because material balance
must be conserved, Vi must equal VLp plus Vf, and
Eqs. 5-10 through 5-12 can be rearranged to yield
5-4. Rock and fluid mechanics
qi t p
Rock and fluid mechanics (along with fluid loss) L , (5-13)
6CL hL t p + 4hL Sp + 2 wh f
considerations control the created fracture dimen-
sions and geometry (i.e., fracture height hf, length showing a general relation between several impor-
L and width w). These considerations all revolve tant fracture variables and design goals.
around the net pressure pnet given by Eq. 5-3. Modeling of hydraulic fracture propagation in
However, pnet, which controls hf and L, is itself a low- to medium-permeability formations typically
function of hf and L, and the various physical behav- shows an average width of about 0.25 in. (50%)
iors connecting height, net pressure, width, etc., over a fairly wide range of conditions (e.g., Abou-
interact in many ways. This makes simple statements Sayed, 1984). Using this value, the effect of the pri-
about the relative importance of variables difficult or mary variables height hf and fluid-loss coefficient
impossible. However, the basic physical phenomena CL on fracture penetration L are investigated in
controlling fracture growth are understood and are Fig. 5-13. This is for a simple case of a constant
well established. 0.25-in. fracture width. Figure 5-13a shows length
as a strong, nearly linear function of hf; e.g., dou-
bling hf cuts fracture penetration by 50%. For similar
5-4.1. Material balance conditions, Fig. 5-13b shows that the fluid-loss coef-
The major equation for fracturing is material bal- ficient is not as important; e.g., doubling CL reduces
ance. This simply says that during pumping a certain L by only about 20%. However, with fracturing, such
volume is pumped into the earth, some part of that is simple relations are never fixed. As seen in Fig.
lost to the formation during pumping, and the 5-13c, for a higher loss case, doubling CL from 0.005
remainder creates fracture volume (length, width and to 0.01 reveals a nearly linear relation between CL
height). It is the role of fracture models to predict and L, just as for height in Fig. 5-13a. Basically, for
how the volume is divided among these three dimen- Figs. 5-13a and 5-13b, the loss term (first term in the
sions. The volume pumped is simply denominator of Eq. 5-13) is small compared with the
fracture volume term (third term in the denominator).
Vi = qi t p , (5-10) Therefore, the fluid loss is relatively low and fracture

(a)
fluid efficiency (, as defined in Eq. 5-11) is high. In
Fig. 5-13c, the loss term is large compared with the
1600 volume term (high loss and low efficiency), and the
CL = 0.001 ft/min1/2
1400 qi = 30 bbl/min loss coefficient becomes the dominant variable, with

w = 0.25 in. hf = hL = 100 ft L less sensitive to variations in hf or equivalently w if
1200 Sp = 0
it varies from the fixed value of 0.25 in.
1000
2:1
L (ft)
800
600 5-4.2. Fracture height
400 hf = hL = 200 ft Equation 5-13 demonstrates that fracture height hf
200 and fluid-loss height hL are important parameters for
0 fracture design. Loss height is controlled by in-situ
0 20 40 60 80 100 variations of porosity and permeability. Fracture
Time (min) height is controlled by the in-situ stresses, in particu-
lar by differences in the magnitude or level of stress
(b) between various geologic layers. More formally,
height is controlled by the ratio of net pressure to
1600
hf = hL = 200 ft stress differences , as illustrated in Fig. 5-9, where
1400 q i = 30 bbl/min
w = 0.25 in.
is the difference between stress in the boundary
1200 Sp = 0 shales and stress in the pay zone. Ignoring any pres-
1000 sure drop caused by vertical fluid flow, the relation
CL = 0.0005 among fracture height, initial fracture height, pnet
L (ft)
800
and can be calculated as demonstrated by
600
Simonson et al. (1978). This relation is included
400 CL = 0.001 in Fig. 5-9c.
200 For cases when pnet is relatively small compared
0 with the existing stress differences (e.g., less than
0 20 40 60 80 100 50% of ), there is little vertical fracture growth
Time (min) and the hydraulic fracture is essentially perfectly
confined. This gives a simple fracture geometry
(c)
(Fig. 5-14a) and increasing net pressure (Fig. 5-14b).
For cases when pnet is much larger than the existing
600
hf = hL = 100 ft stress differences, vertical fracture height growth is
qi = 30 bbl/min
500 w = 0.25 in. essentially unrestrained. Again, the geometry is a
Sp = 0
CL = 0.005 fairly simple radial or circular fracture (Fig. 5-14c)
400
and declining net pressure (Fig. 5-14b).
For more complex cases when pnet is about equal
L (ft)
300
1.8:1 to , fracture geometry becomes more difficult to
200 predict, and significant increases in height can occur
CL = 0.01 for small changes in net pressure. Also, for this case,
100
the viscous pressure drop from vertical flow retards
0 fracture height growth (see Weng, 1991), and the
0 20 40 60 80 100 equilibrium height calculations in Fig. 5-9 are no
Time (min) longer applicable.
Figure 5-13. Effect of hf and CL on L.

(a) Depth
detail in Chapter 6), the slit opens into an elliptical
(ft) shape, with a maximum width
4900
2 pnet d
wmax = , (5-14)
= 1500 psi
E
5000
where E is the plane strain modulus (E = E/(1
2), is Poissons ratio and typically equals about
5100 0.2), and d is the least dimension of the fracture.
pnet < 1/3
For a confined-height fracture with a tip-to-tip length
5200
greater than hf, d equals hf. This shows a direct rela-
3500 5000 100 200 300
tion between net pressure and width and introduces
Stress (psi) Fracture penetration (ft) an important material property, the plane strain mod-
ulus. However, because typically 2 < 0.1, the plane
(b) strain modulus seldom differs from Youngs modulus
E by a significant amount.
2000
CL = 0.002
1000 qi = 20 bbl/min
= 1500 psi hfo = 100 ft
500 5-4.4. Fluid mechanics and fluid flow
Net pressure (psi)
E = 4E+6 psi
= 200 cp
200 The major fluid flow parameters are the fluid viscos-
= 50 psi
100 ity (resistance to flow) and injection rate qi. The
50 rate also effects the pump time and hence is impor-
tant to fluid-loss and material-balance considerations,
20
Shut-in as discussed previously. Both parameters are critical
10
1 2 5 10 20 50 100 200
for proppant transport, and both parameters also
Pump time (min) affect net pressure and thus affect fracture height
and width.
As an example, consider a Newtonian fluid flowing
(c)
Depth laterally through a narrow, vertical slit (i.e., fracture)
(ft) (Fig. 5-15). For laminar flow (the general case for
4800 flow inside hydraulic fractures), the pressure drop
= 50 psi
4900 along some length x of the slit is
pnet 12q
5000
= . (5-15)
5100
x hf w3
5200 Assuming a simple case of a long, constant-height

pnet > 4 and -width fracture with two wings and zero fluid
5300
loss (i.e., the flow rate in each wing is q = qi /2) and
3200 3800 100 200 300 400 500 also assuming zero net pressure at the fracture tip,
Stress (psi) Fracture penetration (ft)
Figure 5-14. Relationship of pnet to stress differences.
q = qi 2
q
5-4.3. Fracture width w v =
hfw
Consider a slit in an infinite elastic media (i.e., the

earth). Also consider that the slit is held closed by
a fracture closure stress but is being opened by an
internal pressure equal to the closure stress plus a net
pressure pnet. Under these conditions (discussed in Figure 5-15. Fluid flowing laterally through a narrow verti-
cal fracture.

Eq. 5-15 is integrated from the fracture tip back to tion in Eq. 5-16 assumes no net pressure at the frac-
the wellbore to give ture tip; i.e., fracture tip effects or fracture propaga-
tion effects are ignored. When tip effects are taken
6qi L
pnet = . (5-16) into account, the fracture width is affected by both
hf w3 fluid viscosity and tip effects (Shlyapobersky et al.,
1988a, 1988b). As shown by Nolte (1991), tip
For this long, confined-height fracture, hf is the
effects can be approximated by considering the net
minimum fracture dimension for Eq. 5-14, and the
pressure within the tip region to equal ptip (as
fracture width and net pressure are related by
opposed to zero) in Eq. 5-16. For a positive tip pres-
E w sure, the net pressure equation becomes
pnet = . (5-17)
2h f 1/ 4
E3
Combining the two equations gives the proportionality pnet 4 {qi L} + ptip
4
, (5-20)
h f
q L
1/ 4
w i . (5-18) where ptip is the pressure required at the fracture tip

E to open new fracture area and keep the fracture prop-
agating forward. This simple relationship serves to
The exponent of 14 for this simple fracture geome-
illustrate that there are always two components to net
try and for Newtonian fluids implies that the fracture
pressure: a viscous component and a fracture tip-
width is virtually constant; e.g., doubling the pump
effects component. The relative magnitude of the
rate from 20 to 40 bbl/min increases the width only
two effects varies from case to case, and because of
by about 20%. The same effect is found for all the
the small exponent, the combined effects are much
variables in Eq. 5-18. Generally, for non-Newtonian
less than the direct sum of the individual effects. For
fluids, the exponent is approximately 13.
example, when the viscous component and the tip
This relationship for fracture width can also be
component are equal, the net pressure is increased by
used with Eq. 5-17 to give net pressure expressed as
only 20% over that predicted when one of the com-
E 3/ 4 ponents is ignored.
pnet = {qi L} ,
1/ 4
(5-19)
hf Fracture toughness and elastic fracture mechanics
where is a constant (see Eq. 6-11) to provide an The fracture tip propagation pressure, or fracture
equality for this expression. tip effect, is generally assumed to follow the
Thus, as a result of viscous forces alone, net pres- physics of elastic fracture mechanics. In that case,
sure inside the fracture develops as a function of the the magnitude of the tip extension pressure ptip is
modulus, height and (q)1/4. From the nature of this controlled by the critical stress intensity factor KIc
relation, however, it is clear that modulus and height (also called the fracture toughness). Fracture
are much more important in controlling net pressure toughness is a material parameter, and it may be
than are pump rate and viscosity, the effect of which defined as the strength of a material in the pres-
is muted by the small exponent for the relation. ence of a preexisting flaw. For example, glass has
a high tensile strength, but the presence of a tiny
scratch or fracture greatly reduces the strength
5-4.5. Fracture mechanics and fracture (i.e., high tensile strength but low fracture tough-
tip effects ness). On the other hand, modeling clay has low
strength, but the presence of a flaw or fracture
The fluid mechanics relations show pnet related
does not significantly reduce the strength. Lab-
to modulus, height, fluid viscosity and pump rate.
oratory-measured values for the material property
However, in some cases, field observations have
KIc show toughness ranging from about 1000 to
shown net pressure (and presumably fracture width)
about 3500 psi/in.1/2, with a typical value of about
to be greater than predicted by Eq. 5-19 (Palmer and
2000 psi/in.1/2. These tests (after Schmidt and
Veatch, 1987). In such cases the fluid viscosity has a
Huddle, 1977; Thiercelin, 1987) include a range
smaller effect on fracture width than predicted by
of rock types from mudstones and sandstones to
Eq. 5-19. This is probably because the simple rela-

carbonates and consider confining pressures from phenomena. Tip phenomena are discussed in
0 to 5000 psi. detail in Chapters 3 and 6.
From elastic fracture mechanics, for a simple Measured values for tip extension pressure
radial or circular fracture geometry with a pene- that are higher than predicted from laboratory-
tration of L, the fracture tip extension pressure is measured rock toughness KIc can be accounted
for in hydraulic fracture calculations through the

ptip = K Ic , (5-21) use of the effective, or apparent, fracture tough-
48 L ness KIc-apparent (Shlyapobersky, 1985). In practice,
because KIc-apparent is not a material constant, the
and it decreases as the fracture extends. For even
tip effects should be defined or calibrated by frac-
a small fracture penetration of 25 ft, this gives a
turing pressure data for a particular situation (see
tip extension pressure of 29 psi, whereas viscous
Sidebar 9B).
pressures (Eq. 5-19) are typically 10 or more
times larger. Thus normal linear elastic fracture
mechanics considerations indicate that fracture 5-4.6. Fluid loss
mechanics, or the tip extension pressure, generally
plays a negligible role for hydraulic fracturing. As seen from the material balance (Eq. 5-13), fluid
Apparent fracture toughness loss is a major fracture design variable characterized
by a fluid-loss coefficient CL and a spurt-loss coeffi-
Field data typically show fracture extension pres- cient Sp. Spurt loss occurs only for wall-building flu-
sure to be greater than that given by Eq. 5-21, ids and only until the filter cake is developed. For
with 100 to 300 psi as typical values and even most hydraulic fracturing cases, the lateral (and ver-
higher values possible. This difference is due to tical) extent of the fracture is much greater than the
several behaviors not included in elastic fracture invasion depth (perpendicular to the planar fracture)
mechanics calculations. One important (and long- of fluid loss into the formation. In these cases, the
recognized) consideration is that the fracturing behavior of the fluid loss into the formation is linear
fluid never quite reaches the fracture tip; i.e., there (1D) flow, and the rate of fluid flow for linear flow
is a fluid lag region at the tip that increases the behavior is represented by Eq. 5-1.
apparent toughness and tip pressure (Fig. 5-16). This assumption of linear flow fluid loss giving the
In other cases, tip pressure may be even greater. CL t relation has been successfully used for fractur-
Other tip phenomena include nonelastic rock ing since its introduction by Carter (1957). The rela-
deformation near the fracture tip and tip plugging tion indicates that at any point along the fracture, the
with fines, with these mechanisms acting alone or rate of fluid loss decreases with time, and anything
in conjunction with the fluid flow and/or fluid lag that violates this assumption can cause severe prob-
lems in treatment design. For example, fluid loss to
Closure stress natural fissures can result in deep filtrate invasion
into the fissures, and the linear flow assumption may
no longer be valid. In fact, for the case of natural fis-
sures if net pressure increases with time, the fluid-
loss rate can increase, and treatment pumping behav-
ior may be quite different from that predicted. The
Fluid
lag total fluid loss from the fracture is controlled by the
total fluid-loss coefficient CL, which Howard and
Fast (1957) decomposed into the three separate
p1 p2
mechanisms illustrated in Fig. 5-17 and discussed
in Section 6-4.
The first mechanism is the wall-building character-
p1 = fracture pressure istics of the fracturing fluid, defined by the wall-
p2 reservoir pressure building coefficient Cw. This is a fluid property that
helps control fluid loss in many cases. For most frac-
Figure 5-16. Unwetted fracture tip (fluid lag). turing fluid systems, in many formations as fluid loss

Invaded Reservoir Closure

For fluid to leak off from the fracture, the reservoir
zone control pressure fluid must be displaced. This sets up some resistance
+ to fluid loss, and this reservoir effect is characterized
pnet
by the compressibility coefficient Cc. As discussed in
Pressure
Chapter 6, the parameter for this calculation is gov-

erned by a pressure difference p between the pres-
Reservoir pressure
sure inside the fracture (i.e., closure pressure + pnet)
and the reservoir pressure, permeability to the mov-
able formation fluid k, total system compressibility
Distance into formation for the reservoir ct, and the viscosity of the reservoir
fluid (gas or oil) . This parameter is usually more
important for a liquid-saturated reservoir (low com-
pressibility and relatively high reservoir fluid viscos-
ity) and when a filter cake does not develop.
Each of these three mechanisms provides some
resistance to fluid loss, and all three act as resistors
in series (although the fluid-loss coefficient itself is
defined in terms of conductance, or the inverse of
resistance). The three mechanisms variously com-
Filter cake
bine in different situations to form the total or com-
Figure 5-17. The three regions of fluid loss. bined fluid-loss coefficient CL, which is used for
fracture design (see Chapter 6). This clearly complex
occurs into the formation, some of the additives and situation makes it desirable to measure fluid loss
chemicals in the fluid system remain trapped on or from field tests (just as permeability must be mea-
near the formation face, forming a physical filter- sured from field flow, buildup tests or both) when-
cake barrier that resists fluid loss. ever possible (see Chapter 9).
Outside of the filter cake is the invaded zone,
which is the small portion of the formation that has
been invaded by the fracturing fluid filtrate. This
5-4.7. Variable sensitivities and
mechanism is the filtrate effect, or invaded zone
interactions
effect, and it is characterized by the viscosity or rela- The complexity of hydraulic fracture design comes
tive permeability control coefficient Cv. As discussed from the interactions of the major design variables
in Chapter 6, Cv can be calculated, and this parame- (hf, E, , KIc and CL) and that different variables
ter is governed by the relative permeability of the affect different aspects of fracturing in different ways.
formation to the fracturing fluid filtrate kfil, the pres- As discussed in Section 5-4.1 concerning the sensitiv-
sure difference p between the pressure inside the ity of fracture penetration to hf and CL, the impor-
fracture (i.e., closure pressure + pnet) and the reser- tance of various variables can change from case to
voir pressure, and the viscosity of the fracturing fluid case. Several examples of this are discussed here.
filtrate fil. This mechanism is usually most impor-
Net pressure
tant in gas wells, where the invading fluid has much
higher viscosity than the reservoir fluid being dis- The magnitude of net pressure for a specific frac-
placed, or where relative permeability effects pro- ture treatment is a major concern, because the
duce a filtrate permeability that is much less (<k/10) ratio of net pressure to stress differences between
than the permeability to the reservoir fluid. Other the pay zone and bounding zones controls fracture
cases are where a clean fluid is used such that no fil- height. Also, net pressure directly controls width.
ter cake develops or for fracturing high-permeability However, what controls net pressure varies signif-
wells where no filter cake develops and high-viscos- icantly from case to case.
ity crosslinked gel may be lost to the formation (i.e., In the case of hard-rock formations (i.e., forma-
fil is very high). tions with values for Youngs modulus of 2 106
psi or greater) with height confinement and for

treatments pumping viscous fluids at normal frac-

(a)
turing rates, the viscous term of the net pressure
equation dominates any fracture tip effects. 2000
Toughness or tip effects become important for = 200 cp
1000
cases where fracture height is unconfined (e.g., = 50 cp
radial or circular fractures) or for very soft rocks 500
pnet (psi)
(e.g., formations such as unconsolidated sands 200
with E 0.5 106 psi). For treatments using low-
100
viscosity fluid or pumping at very low rates, the Nolte-Smith plot
50 = 1000 psi
viscous term of the net pressure equation becomes
qi = 15 bbl/min
small, and fracture toughness becomes a dominant 20 hf = 25 ft
E = 5 106 psi
parameter. Although many cases fall into one of
0
these extremes, neither effect should be over- 0 0.2 0.5 1 2 5 10 20 50 100 200 500
looked for the prudent application of fracturing. Pump time (min)
The magnitude of net pressure may also be con-
(b)
trolled by in-situ stress differences between the
Depth
pay and the bounding layers. Consider a case (ft)
where barrier zones (e.g., formations with higher
closure stress) surround the pay zone (Fig. 5-9)
and further assume that because of either viscous
4900
or toughness effects, pnet increases to the level of
the stress differences. Massive height growth then Perforated
begins, and only very small increases in the net interval
pressure are possible. Net treating pressure is now 5000

controlled directly by and is essentially inde-
pendent of both fluid viscosity and apparent frac-
ture toughness effects. This case is illustrated in 5100
the next section.
Fracture height and net pressure
For a fracture with significant stress barriers and
in a formation with a medium to high value for 3500 4000 4500 0.2 0 0.2
In-situ stress (psi) Width (in.)
the modulus, the viscous term in Eq. 5-20 controls
the net treating pressure. In such a case, pnet Figure 5-18. Height growth example in a hard-rock forma-
becomes a strong function of fracture height. tion.
However, as illustrated in Fig. 5-9, fracture height
hf is controlled by net pressure. To put it in anoth-
er form, fracture height is a function of fracture 1000 psi (i.e., is controlling pnet), and exten-
height. As discussed in Chapter 6, this is where sive height growth occurs. Because is control-
fracture models become important. ling the allowable net pressure, increasing the
As an example, consider the case of a thin fluid viscosity fourfold has essentially no effect on
(h = 25 ft) sandstone pay zone in a hard-rock for- net pressure after the first few minutes. The verti-
mation (E = 5 106 psi). Further assume that this cal fracture width profile plotted in Fig. 5-18b
zone is surrounded by shales with an in-situ stress shows that for pnet about equal to , fracture
1000 psi greater than the stress in the sand, mak- width in the bounding layers may be too small for
ing them what would normally be considered proppant admittance. This is discussed in the sub-
good barriers to vertical fracture growth. As seen sequent section on proppant admittance.
in Fig. 5-18a, even for pumping a moderate (50-cp) Now consider the same case but with a 50-ft
viscosity fluid at a moderate rate, net pressure thick sandstone section. As seen in Fig. 5-19, pnet
immediately jumps to a level slightly greater than stays below for the 50-cp fluid case and little

(a)
2000
= 200 cp
1000 2000 Nolte-Smith plot
Confined height
500 1000 Tip-dominated behavior
= 50 cp
pnet (psi)
200 500
= 50 cp
pnet (psi)
100 200
= 1000 psi
50 q = 15 bbl/min 100
i
hf = 50 ft
20 E = 5 106 psi 50
= 1000 psi
0 q = 15 bbl/min
20 hi = 25 ft
0 0.2 0.5 1 2 5 10 20 50 100200 500 f
E = 5 106 psi
Pump time (min)
0.2 0.5 1 2 5 10 20 50 100 200 500
Figure 5-19. Height growth example in a thicker hard-rock Pump time (min)
formation. (b)
Depth
(ft)
height growth occurs. For a more viscous (200-cp)
fluid, net pressure again approaches the stress dif-
ference of 1000 psi, and again extensive height 4900
growth occurs. These examples show that fracture Perforated
interval
height is a function of fracture height. 5000
Finally, consider the original (h = 25 ft) case
again, but assume this is a soft-rock (unconsoli-
dated sand with E < 0.5 106 psi) zone. Further 5100
assume that because of high permeability, fluid

loss is much greater than for the previous two
3500 4500 100 200 300 400
cases. Figure 5-20 shows pnet is much less than
In-situ stress (psi) Fracture penetration, L (ft)
, with essentially no height growth. Also, the
flat nature of the net pressure behavior in the
Figure 5-20. Height growth example in a soft-rock
Nolte-Smith log-log plot of pnet versus time indi- formation.
cates that fracture tip effects are dominating net
pressure behavior, as expected from Eq. 5-20. permeability formation it is probable that the frac-
Chapter 9 discusses net pressure behavior and the turing fluid cannot build a filter cake to control
means to determine the controlling conditions. fluid loss, and the only fluid-loss control will
Fluid viscosity come from the viscosity (or invaded zone) effect
Fluid viscosity provides an example of how vari- Cv (see Section 5-4.6). Viscosity is therefore a
ables affect different parts of the fracturing pro- major factor for fluid selection, despite having no
cess in different ways. Consider a case of radial effect on geometry and not being critical for prop-
fracture growth in a soft rock (E < 1 106 psi). pant transport.
Toughness dominates pnet and fracture width, and
viscosity becomes unimportant in controlling frac-
ture geometry. However, viscosity can remain a 5-5. Treatment pump scheduling
critical consideration for proppant transport if a The fracture design process involves reservoir engi-
long fracture is desired and for fluid-loss control. neering to define the xf and kfw goals. It involves
Further assume this case is a very high perme- rock mechanics to consider the possibility of obtain-
ability formation, such that only a short fracture is ing a desired fracture geometry. It includes fluid
required. Thus, high viscosity is not required for mechanics considerations to confirm that the
proppant transport. However, in this very high required proppant transport is possible and rheology
to determine if the required fluid properties are pos-

sible. It also includes material selection and on-site 5-5.2. Pad volume
operational considerations as discussed in Section
5-6. The product of this process is a treatment pump For a treatment using viscous fluid, the fluid carries
schedule. This includes the pad volume necessary the proppant out to the fracture tip. For these cases
to create the desired fracture penetration, along with the pad volume determines how much fracture pene-
acid or proppant scheduling to achieve the desired tration can be achieved before proppant reaches the
postfracture conductivity. For propped fracturing, tip and stops penetration in the pay zone. Once the
pump scheduling includes fluid selection, proppant pad is depleted, a fracture may continue to propagate
selection, pad volume, maximum proppant concen- into impermeable layers until the proppant bridges in
tration to be used and a proppant addition schedule. low-width areas. Thus, pumping sufficient pad to
After the design goals and variables are defined, the create the selected length is critical. For treatments
proppant addition schedule is usually obtained by using very low viscosity fluid (i.e., banking-type
using a fracture simulator, although for many cases treatments), proppant settles out of the fluid and
analytical calculations based on fluid efficiency are essentially replenishes the pad. The pad volume must
also easily implemented. Chapter 10 provides addi- only be sufficient to open enough fracture width for
tional detail for treatment design. proppant admittance, and the carrying capacity of the
fluid, as opposed to the pad volume, determines the
final propped length.
5-5.1. Fluid and proppant selection On the other hand, too much pad can in some
instances be even more harmful, particularly for
Fracturing materials are discussed in Chapter 7, and cases requiring high fracture conductivity. The frac-
their performance characterization is discussed in ture tip continues to propagate after pumping stops,
Chapter 8. The major considerations for fluid selec- leaving a large, unpropped region near the fracture
tion are usually viscosity (for width, proppant trans- tip. Significant afterflow can then occur in the frac-
port or fluid-loss control) and cleanliness (after flow- ture, carrying proppant toward the tip and leaving
back) to produce maximum postfracture conduct- a poor final proppant distribution. This afterflow
ivity. Other considerations that may be major for occurs because the widest section of the fracture is
particular cases include near the wellbore at shut-in, and most of the prop-
compatibility with reservoir fluids and reservoir rock pant pumped is stored there. However, the highest
compatibility with reservoir pressure (e.g., foams fluid-loss rates are near the fracture tip. Thus, prop-
to aid flowback in low-pressure reservoirs) pant-laden slurry continues to flow toward the tip of
the fracture. Afterflow continues until either the frac-
surface pump pressure or pipe friction considerations ture closes on the proppant, stopping proppant move-
cost ment, or until proppant-laden slurry reaches the frac-
compatibility with other materials (e.g., resin- ture tip. At that point the slurry dehydrates and stops
coated proppant) any additional fracture propagation. Ideally, of
safety and environmental concerns (see Chapter 11). course, it is better to have the proppant at the frac-
ture tip at shut-in and thus minimize afterflow.
Proppant selection must consider conductivity at An ideal schedule for a normal treatment (as
in-situ stress conditions (i.e., the effect of stress on opposed to subsequently discussed TSO designs) is
proppant permeability kf). Proppant size must also be one where the pad depletes and proppant reaches the
considered. In general, bigger proppant yields better fracture tip just as the desired fracture penetration is
conductivity, but size must be checked against prop- achieved and also just as pumping stops. This is the
pant admittance criteria, both through the perforations sequence in Figs. 5-2, 5-3 and 5-4.
and inside the fracture (see Section 5-5.4). Finally, The critical parameter of the pad volume or pad
the maximum in-situ proppant concentration at shut- fraction fpad is related directly to the fluid efficiency
in must be selected, as it determines how much of the for a treatment (Nolte, 1986b). This relation from
hydraulic width created by the fracture treatment will Sidebar 6L gives the pad volume expressed as
be retained as propped width once the fracture closes. a fraction of the entire treatment volume:

1
f pad . (5-22) 1.0
1+ % of fracture filled by proppant pack
Pack porosity = 0.35
0.8
That is, a treatment with an expected efficiency
of 50% would require a pad fraction of about 13. As
Fill fraction, F
0.6
discussed in Chapter 9, the efficiency for a specific Proppant s.g. = 2.65
(sand)
formation and fluid system can be determined by a 0.4
calibration treatment. Proppant s.g. = 3.2
(intermediate strength)
This discussion of pad volume has so far concen- 0.2
trated on the fluid-loss aspects of the pad volume;
i.e., the pad is pumped first to serve as a sacrificial 0.0
0 4 8 12 16 20 24
stage of the treatment to enable the fracture to pene-
Proppant concentration (lbm/gal)
trate into permeable formations. This important effect
of the pad volume may be the critical aspect govern- Figure 5-21. Fill fraction versus proppant concentration.
ing the size of the pad for most applications. How-
ever, hydraulic fracturing is complicated, in that most
things are done for at least two reasons, which where F is the fill fraction (Fig. 5-21), the con-
applies to pad volume specification. The second pur- stant 8.33 converts the units to lbm/gal, prop is
pose of the pad volume is to create sufficient fracture the specific gravity (s.g.) of the proppant, C is the
width to allow proppant to enter the fracture (see final in-situ proppant concentration at shut-in
Section 5-5.4 on proppant admittance). Even for a expressed as pounds of proppant per fluid gallon
case of very low fluid loss, some minimum pad vol- (ppg), and is the porosity of the proppant pack,
ume is required. Both of these aspects of the pad vol- typically about 0.35.
ume must always be considered for treatment design. Increasing the concentration from 8 (F 0.4)
Propped width to 16 ppg (F 0.6) significantly increases the
propped fracture width (50% increase in the fill
A major design goal is fracture conductivity kf w,
fraction). However, this large increase in propped
which consists of proppant pack permeability and
width is accomplished at the expense of additional
propped fracture width. Proppant permeability kf
risk to the job and to the well, because of either
is a function of the proppant selected, in-situ
surface mechanical problems or an unexpected
stress and residual damage from fluid additives
total screenout somewhere in the fracture or in the
(see Chapter 8). Propped width is controlled by
near-wellbore region between the well and the far-
the treatment design.
field fracture (see the discussion of tortuosity in
The effective propped width wp-eff is a function
Section 6-6). In practice, most treatments use a
of the average fracture width wf at shutdown (i.e.,
maximum concentration of about 8 to 14 ppg,
hydraulic width at the end of pumping a treat-
although concentrations of 20 ppg have been
ment), proppant concentration C in the fracture at
pumped.
that time (i.e., giving the ideal propped width wp)
Another manner of increasing propped width is
and the volume of proppant wlost that is lost on the
to increase fracture width. Theoretical and numer-
faces of the fracture to embedment, gel residue,
ical models generally show that the fracture
etc. (usually expressed as lbm/ft2 lost). In terms
width, while the fracture is growing, is relatively
of these parameters, the effective propped width
insensitive to the controllable job variables of
can be expressed as
pump rate and fluid viscosity. For a simple frac-
w peff = w p wlost = w f F wlost (5-23) ture geometry, width is proportional to rate and
viscosity raised to a small power. For Eq. 5-18
with the exponent 14, doubling the pump rate
C
F= increases fracture width by only 18%, at the
( )
,
8.33 prop + C (1 )
(5-24)
expense of significant pipe friction and surface

pressure increases. Viscosity is easily increased by ture (see Section 6-5). First is what may be termed
an order of magnitude (e.g., 10 times increase in simple or single-particle settling. Behavior of this
increases the width by 77%), but only at the type is governed by Stokes law, in which the veloc-
expense of using more fluid additives and with ity of a single particle falling through a liquid medi-
additional conductivity damage potentially negat- um is
ing the extra width.
Thus, the hydraulic fracture width is fairly fixed v fall = 1.15 10 3
d 2prop

( )
prop fluid , (5-25)
(50%, at least in terms of the treatments control-
lable parameters), and the proppant fill fraction has where vfall is the settling rate in ft/s, dprop is the aver-
a practical limit of about 0.5 (0.1). Without TSO age proppant particle diameter in in., is the fluid
designs (discussed in the following) the final, viscosity in cp, and prop and fluid are the specific
effective propped width is almost fixed by nature. gravity of the proppant and the fluid, respectively.
The goal for a normal fracture design is then to The settling rate, and thus the efficiency with which
achieve a required kf w within these limits, with proppant can be transported into the fracture, is
proppant concentration, proppant selection and directly related to the fluid viscosity. This is usually
fluid selection allowing a large range of values. the main consideration for how much viscosity is
Tip-screenout designs required for a fracture treatment. However, there are
As mentioned previously, as long as a fracture is additional considerations for calculating settling fol-
free to propagate, the hydraulic fracture width is lowing Stokes law. At low proppant concentrations
relatively insensitive to the controllable treatment (e.g., less than 1 or 2 ppg) particles may clump, pro-
parameters of fluid viscosity and pump rate. If ducing an apparent diameter greater than the actual
more conductivity is required than can be particle diameter and accelerating settling. Higher
achieved from a normal design, the only effective particle concentrations act to increase the slurry vis-
manner to increase the propped width is to stop cosity and retard settling (also known as hindered
the fracture from propagating but to continue to settling). The pump rate is also an important param-
pump. This technique has come to be called TSO eter controlling proppant transport for simple settling
fracturing (Smith et al., 1984). by Stokes law.
For a normal treatment, the pad volume is As shown in Fig. 5-22, for a Newtonian fluid the
designed to deplete just as pumping stops. What distance D a proppant particle is transported into a
would happen if pumping simply continued fracture, before that particle can fall from the top of
beyond that time? If the pad is depleted, then
proppant-laden slurry will be located everywhere
around the fracture periphery. If there is fluid loss,
then this slurry will dehydrate and leave packed
proppant around the periphery. Even with no fluid v1
loss, the proppant may bridge in the narrow frac- h
ture width around the periphery, particularly in vfall
places where the width is extremely narrow as a
result of the fracture penetrating a boundary layer.
In either case, any additional propagation is D
restricted and further pumping causes an increase
D h = v1 /v 2
of net pressure and thus an increase of fracture
width. TSO designs are discussed in detail in v1 = fluid velocity
Chapter 10. qi/hw qi/h(qi)1/4
qi3/4/h1/4
vfall = fall rate 1/
5-5.3. Proppant transport D/h (qi)3/4/h
D is independent of h
Several modes of proppant settling can occur while
proppant is being transported into a hydraulic frac- Figure 5-22. Stokes law.

the fracture to the bottom, is related to (qi)3/4. This fluid (which describes most fracturing fluid systems)
distance is independent of the fracture height and, flowing down a channel imparts a normal force to
more significantly, shows that for some given trans- particles entrained in the fluid such that the particles
port distance, less viscosity can be used at higher tend to migrate to and concentrate in the center of
pump rates. This relation can be important for higher the channel. For low average concentrations, this can
temperature applications, where fluid viscosity can result in a center core of high-proppant-concentration
degrade significantly with time. At higher rates (and slurry, with a region of essentially clean fluid on
hence shorter pump times), less viscosity is required either side. This heavier core of concentrated slurry
for proppant transport. Also, the fluid is exposed to tends to fall owing to its greater density, carrying the
the high formation temperature for less time, so the entrained proppant toward the bottom of the fracture
fluid system maintains better viscosity. In general, at a faster rate than for a dispersed slurry (Nolte,
considering how fluid viscosity degrades down a 1988b).
fracture, including the effect of proppant concentra- Finally, any calculations for proppant settling must
tion increasing the effective slurry viscosity, and consider geologic reality. Detailed examinations of
considering the non-Newtonian nature of most hydraulic fractures both at the wellbore using televi-
fracturing fluids, if a fracturing fluid retains 50- to sion cameras (Smith et al., 1982) or away from wells
100-cp viscosity (at reservoir temperature and at a in mineback tests (see Warpinski, 1985) show some-
shear rate of 170 s1) at the end of the fracture treat- thing other than the smooth fracture walls assumed
ment, it will provide essentially perfect proppant for settling calculations. Small shifts and jogs of the
transport (Nolte, 1982). fracture probably have no significant impact on fluid
The next mode of proppant settling is termed con- flow or on lateral proppant transport into the frac-
vection, and it was probably first included in fracture ture. However, these small irregularities could signif-
modeling in the context of a fully three-dimensional icantly impact settling. Calculations for proppant set-
(3D) planar model by Clifton and Wang (1988). This tling that ignore these effects will be a worst-case
type of settling is controlled by density differences scenario.
(i.e., buoyancy) between two fluids. For example,
a proppant-laden fluid stage with an 8-ppg concen-
tration has a slurry density of 11.9 lbm/gal (s.g. = 5-5.4. Proppant admittance
1.44). If this slurry is placed directly next to a clean Proppant admittance is critical to hydraulic fracturing
fluid stage with a density of 8.5 lbm/gal (s.g. = 1.02), in two forms: entrance to the fracture through perfora-
the heavier slurry will tend to sink and underride the tions and entrance of proppant into the fracture itself.
lighter clean fluid, simply carrying the proppant These effects were recognized early, and the original
toward the bottom of the fracture. However, a treat- fracture width models were used primarily for deter-
ment does not normally follow clean pad fluid with mining a pad volume that would allow admittance by
a heavy 8-ppg slurry. Rather, the treatment increases generating a fracture width greater than 2.5dprop,
proppant concentration slowly to account for fluid- where dprop is the average proppant particle diameter.
loss effects and mitigate convection effects. Only Before these models, operators were reluctant to
near the end of pumping (when the need for trans- pump significant volumes of pad as it was considered
port decreases), when the initial proppant stages expensive and potentially damaging.
have undergone significant dehydration, can a signif- The laboratory data in Fig. 5-23 (Gruesbeck and
icant density difference begin to develop. In general, Collins, 1978) illustrate two important ideas:
rigorous numerical modeling of this phenomena
shows convection is not a major factor during pump- A minimum perforation diameter is required for
ing (Smith et al., 1997). If excessive pad is used, proppant to flow through the perforations.
such that a large unpropped region of the fracture Minimum perforation diameter is a function of the
exists after shut-in, convection can occur during the slurry concentration.
shut-in after flow, with potentially significant adverse At low concentrations (e.g., 1 ppg), the perforation
effects on the final proppant placement. hole diameter must be only slightly greater than that
The third effect on proppant transport is termed of the proppant particles. The required hole diameter
migration (see Chapter 6). In brief, a viscoelastic increases with concentration until at about 6 ppg

Maximum particle concentration (vol/vol) Table 5-1. Proppant admittance criteria.

8 0.185 0.312 0.405
Proppant
7 Concentration

average particle diameter
(lbm proppant/gal fluid) w /dprop

Perforation diameter/
6
Experimental Correlation
5 Bridge Formation Bridge
100-cp HEC solution
4 0.5 to 2 1.8 1.15 to 2.0
Tap water
3
2 to 5 2.2 2.0 to 3.0
2
5 to 8 2.6 3.0
1 Sand as proppant
Data from van der Vlis et al. (1975)
0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
Sand concentration
(lbm sand/gal fluid)
6 to 8 ppg, the required average fracture width
Figure 5-23. Proppant admittance through perforations increases to 3dprop.
(Gruesbeck and Collins, 1978). This critical width is important to the hydraulic
fracturing process. Should proppant enter a part of the
fracture where sufficient width does not exist, the
(solid volume fraction of about 0.20), the perforation proppant will bridge and no longer flow down the
hole diameter must be 6 times the average particle fracture. Additional slurry flowing in this direction
diameter. will cause proppant to pile up, dehydrate and block
This same trend applies for slurry flow down a nar- that part of the fracture. Should this occur near the
row fracture. An approximate proppant bridging or wellbore, possibly as a result of some form of near-
proppant admittance criteria can be derived by calcu- wellbore width restriction (see tortuosity discussion in
lating an equivalent hydraulic radius for a narrow Section 6-8), a total screenout can result with serious
slot, rhyd = w/2, where w is the average width of the consequences for the success of the fracture treatment.
fracture. For a round perforation hole, the hydraulic
radius is d/4, where d is the perforation hole diameter.
Equating the two hydraulic radius values shows that 5-5.5. Fracture models
2w is equivalent to the diameter of a round hole.
Using this along with two lines fitting the data Clearly, developing a final treatment pump schedule
of Gruesbeck and Collins leads to an approximate must consider many options. The interactive roles of
admittance criteria for a hydraulic fracture: the various major variables (hf, E, CL, KIc-apparent,
and qi) must be considered along with the various
For a proppant solid volume fraction fv less than roles of fluid viscosity for net pressure, width, prop-
0.17, the average width must be greater than pant transport and fluid loss. In addition, the design
(1 + 2fv /0.17) dprop. must consider the various roles of the pad volume
For fv greater than 0.17, the average width must be concerning fluid loss and creating fracture width.
greater than 3dprop (i.e., a width greater than three Fracture simulators, or fracture placement models,
proppant grain diameters). provide the means to handle this complexity and to
consider the interaction of the multitude of variables.
This approximate correlation also compares well
For this reason, a final schedule is generally devel-
with other experimental data from proppant-laden
oped using a fracture geometry model. However, as
slurry flowed through a narrow slot (van der Vlis et
discussed in Section 5-5.2, Sidebar 6L and Section
al., 1975), although the correlation may be optimistic
10-4, in many instances an acceptable pump schedule
for low proppant concentrations. As shown in Table
can be developed more simply for a treatment on the
5-1, the behavior for bridging in a fracture is similar
basis of the expected fluid efficiency (as determined
to bridging in perforation holes. At low proppant
from a calibration treatment). The use of a properly
concentrations, the average fracture width must be
calibrated fracture geometry model also enables the
only slightly greater than the average particle diame-
consideration of multiple scenarios for designing the
ter. As the proppant concentration increases toward

optimum treatment for a specific application. This with a large hydraulic fracture may drain the reser-
approach is briefly discussed in Section 5-6.1. voir much faster, making the economics much more
attractive despite the additional cost of the treatment.
Carrying this forward, 2, 10 or 100 or more wells
5-6. Economics and operational could be drilled and/or fractured. Between these
considerations extremes is the optimum plan, which is the number
of wells, number of fractured wells or both that max-
The preceding discussion covers most of the techni-
imize the economic value of the production com-
cal aspects of hydraulic fracturing (reservoir engi-
pared with the development capital costs and the
neering, fluid mechanics, rock mechanics, etc.) and
ongoing operating costs.
reviews the complex interactions that exist between
As a simple example, the process (at least for a
the various, often competing design variables.
single well) could proceed as pictured in Fig. 5-24
However, to complicate things further, hydraulic
(Veatch, 1986). First, reservoir engineering calcula-
fracturing and treatment design are generally gov-
tions provide a production forecast for various com-
erned byor are at least sensitive totwo final
binations of fracture half-length xf and conductivity
considerations: economics and field operations.
kf w (including the case of no fracture at all). Based
on some future price forecast, this allows calculation
5-6.1. Economics of a present value, which is the future revenue from
the production less future operating costs and dis-
At the most basic level, hydraulic fracturing is about counted back to the present. Hydraulic fracturing
time and money: economics. Given reasonable calculations based on fluid loss, fracture height, etc.,
geologic continuity, a single well would, given suffi- are used to determine the treatment volumes required
cient time, drain an entire reservoir. However, the to generate various combinations of fracture length
operating costs of maintaining a well over the and propped fracture width, and these calculations
decades required to accomplish this drainage would are easily converted into estimated treatment costs.
probably make the entire operation unattractive from Some form of net revenue economic analysis is then
a commercial viewpoint. Alternatively, a single well used to determine the best type of proppant, desired
Discounted revenue ($)
Cumulative production
x f = x f2
kfw = kfw2 kfw = kfw2
x f = x f1
kfw = kfw1 kfw = kfw1
No fracture
Revenue less cost ($)
Time xf kfw = kfw1
kfw = kfw2
Treatment volume
xf
Cost ($)
kfw = kfw2
kfw = kfw1
xf xf
Figure 5-24. Veatch (1986) economics diagrams.

fracture length and other requirements for the opti- to the hydrostatic head of the fluid in the wellbore
mum treatment. phead and the pipe friction ppipe friction:
There are, of course, many variations of this basic
process. For example, full-cycle economics includes psurf = c + pnet + p pipe friction phead (5-26)
drilling and other completion costs, along with frac-
ture treatment costs, in determining the optimum
fracture design. This type of analysis is usually hhp qi psurf . (5-27)
appropriate in any case involving multiple wells
(e.g., should a resource be developed using 10 wells Pipe friction is a major term, and thus the size
with huge fractures or 20 wells with smaller or no of the well tubulars has a strong influence on
fracture treatments?). Point-forward analysis, on the allowable pump rates (because pipe friction is typ-
other hand, considers only the fracture treatment ically related to ve, where v = qi/A is the flow
costs (because drilling and other completion costs velocity down the tubing, and e is typically about
are already expended) and is most appropriate for 1.1 to 1.7). Also, the strength and condition of the
working over existing wells. tubulars (along with the associated wellhead
equipment) set an allowable surface pressure and
thus indirectly set an allowable injection rate. In
5-6.2. Operations addition, the size, type and condition of the well-
As discussed in the preceding section, economics bore tubulars may limit (or prohibit) future work-
provides the final design consideration for hydraulic over and recompletion opportunities.
fracturing, whereas field conditions provide the prac- A critical aspect of wellbore considerations is a
tical limits within which the design must fit. Even good cement job around the casing or liner to pro-
beyond defining these limiting conditions, however, vide zonal isolation. In general, a fracture grows
any design is only as good as its execution; thus the where nature dictates, and the engineer has little
treatment must be pumped as designed. Field opera- control over fracture height growth. The only con-
tions and operational considerations impact trol possible is the ability to specify where the
hydraulic fracturing in two ways: perforations are placed and the fracture initiates.
If that ability is compromised by a poor cement
prefracture condition of the wellbore, quality of sheath around the casing that allows the perfora-
the cement job, perforations, pressure limits, etc., tions to communicate directly with an undesired
with these considerations defining practical limits interval, then even this minimal level of control is
that the design must meet lost, and the hydraulic fracture treatment may be
quality assurance and quality control (QA/QC) seriously compromised.
before and during the actual treatment. Another important consideration is the perfora-
These operational considerations are discussed in tions that allow the fluid to leave the wellbore and
Chapters 7 and 11, with some of the major items create the fracture. The number and size of the
highlighted in the following. perforation holes are important for proppant
admittance, as discussed briefly in Section 5-5.4
Wellbore considerations and in detail in Section 11-3.
Some of the major wellbore considerations for Quality assurance and quality control
hydraulic fracturing include
Quality issues are critical for hydraulic fracturing.
size and condition of wellbore tubulars After proppant pumping starts, a treatment cannot
quality of the cement job for zonal isolation be stopped because of problems without signifi-
perforations cantly compromising the design goals. For this
time period, everything must work, including
wellbore deviation.
the wellbore equipment, pumping and blending
During a hydraulic fracture treatment, the pre- equipment and chemicals (i.e., the fluid system).
dicted surface pressure psurf and the hydraulic To cite a simple example, if a treatment uses
horsepower required for a treatment are related 10 tanks of batch-mixed fluid, and one of the

tanks is bad, then the QA score is a relatively high

90%. However, if the bad fluid is pumped just
after proppant addition starts, it may easily cause
total failure of the treatment, and if successful
treatment is critical to economic success of the
well, this causes total economic failure. Typically,
this type of failure cannot be overcome without
completely redrilling the well (refracturing opera-
tions are usually a risky procedure), and thus 90%
can be a failing grade for QA.


Appendix: Evolution of Hydraulic
Fracturing Design and Evaluation
K. G. Nolte, Schlumberger Dowell
Overview reservoir management (i.e., control of both the verti-

cal and horizontal flow profiles within the reser-
This Appendix to Chapter 5 reviews the evolution voir). Similar speculation in a 1985 lecture sug-
of hydraulic fracturing design and evaluation gested that development of the technical foundation
methods. Complementary reviews are the applica- for the TSO generation would quickly bring higher
tion of fracturing by Smith and Hannah (1996) and permeability formations into consideration as typical
fracturing fluids by Jennings (1996). This review of fracturing candidates (i.e., moderate k (2) on
design and evaluation considers three generations of Appendix Fig. 1a, with 2 indicating a target for
fracturing: damage bypass, massive treatments and folds of increase [FOI] in the production rate, in
tip-screenout (TSO) treatments. contrast to 10 for tight gas and massive treat-
The first two generations of fracturing and their ments). However, the advent of this generation was
links to practices are emphasized because these con- considerably delayed because of two factors that
tributions are not likely well known by the current have generally dominated technical considerations
generation of engineers. The review focuses on during the history of fracturing. These dominating
propped fracturing and does not explicitly consider factors are hydrocarbon prices and resistance to try-
acid fracturing. Although the principles governing ing something new until established practices fail to
the mechanics of both are essentially the same, the allow the economic development of a prospect.
fluid chemistry for obtaining fracture conductivity The cycles of fracturing activity in Appendix Fig.
is quite different (see Chapter 7). These principles 1a clearly reflect the timing of the first two fractur-
have their roots in civil and mechanical engineering, ing generations. Appendix Fig. 1b identifies eco-
more specifically in the general area of applied nomic drivers for corresponding cycles in the U.S.
mechanics: solid mechanics for the rock deforma- rig count. The first surge of activity resulted when
tion and fluid mechanics for the flow within the rotary drilling was introduced, which enabled the
fracture and porous media. For the porous media development of deeper reserves. Fracturing activity
aspects, fracturing evaluation has benefited greatly followed this trend soon after its commercialization
from the reservoir engineering practices discussed in 1949 because it was found to be an effective,
in Chapters 2 and 12. low-cost means of mitigating the resulting drilling
This review reflects the authors perspective and mud damage to reservoir sections (i.e., the damage
bias in interpreting the impact of past contributions, bypass generation). Both drilling and fracturing
and therefore parts of this review should be antici- activities began a long-term decline after 1955
pated to raise objections from others with an exten- because of degrading prices caused by imported oil
sive knowledge of fracturing. In addition to this and regulated gas prices. Similarly, both activities
volume, the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) began a rapid increase at about 1979 as prices
Monograph Recent Advances in Hydraulic Frac- increased because the Organization of Petroleum
turing (Gidley et al., 1989) provides balanced, Exporting Countries (OPEC) reduced its oil supplies
detailed coverage of the diverse areas of fracturing and a natural gas shortage developed in the United
from the perspectives of more than 30 fracturing States. The gas shortage, and its 10-fold-plus
specialists. increase in price, encouraged the development of
This review concludes with speculation concern- tight gas reserves and an associated demand for
ing a future generation, in which fracture design and massive fracturing treatments to develop the tight
reservoir engineering merge into fracturing for reserves. The failure of past fracturing practices for
Reservoir Stimulation A5-1

packing to achieve low-skin completions for a signif-

(a) icant venture in the Gulf of Mexico.
4000
The potential for a future reservoir management
generation was demonstrated in 1994 for the Nor-
(2)
tivity
wegian Gullfaks field. The potential is to use TSO
rate k
ls,
onduc
treatments and indirect vertical fracturing for
ria
eq ding 10)
me ate
age
Treatments
Mode
s(
increased reserves recovery, formation solids control
uip , m
High c
dam
nt
ga
de ight
and water management. However, the unique bene-
ove
an
T
?
rst
fits and favorable economics for this different
Rem
Un
approach to reservoir plumbing were slow to
materialize because of the industrys comfort with
0
1950 1955 1971 1981 deviated drilling and more traditional completions.
Year Another observation from this historical perspec-
tive is the 1985 forecast of a flat drilling level
(b)
(Appendix Fig. 1b). However, activity continued to
4500 decrease rapidly, to less than one-half of the forecast,
Annual average rotary rig count
OPEC overextends
4000 U.S. gas prices regulated Prices fall and subsequently declined by another one-half. Stable
3500 Middle East discoveries
activity levels within the petroleum industry are not
3000 U.S. production peaks
seen in the historical cycles and remain the product
ear
OPEC develops
%/y
2500 price authority 1985 forcast flat

r
ea
of wishful thinking.
15.1
Do
/y
wn
9%
2000
Down 25
6.
Up
9.
1%
Up
/ye
1500 ar
.5%/yea
1000
500 Rotary displaces
The beginning
r
cable tool drilling

0
1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 The concept of hydraulic fracturing within the petro-
Year leum industry was developed during the last half of
the 1940s within Stanolind (now BP Amoco; e.g.,
Appendix Figure 1. (a) Trends in fracturing activity treat- Clark, 1949; Farris, 1953; Howard and Fasts
ments per month (courtesy of K. G. Nolte and M. B. Smith, Hydraulic Fracturing Monograph, 1970) by building
19851986 SPE Distinguished Lecture). (b) U.S. drilling rig
activity shows five major trends (updated from Oil & Gas on the industrys experience with injection tech-
Journal, 1985). niques that had experienced increased injectivity
by fracturing: acidizing (Grebe and Stoesser, 1935),
large treatments spurred a significant research and squeeze cementing and brine injection wells. A re-
development effort that beneficially impacted every issued patent was granted (Farris, 1953, resulting
aspect of fracturing and essentially developed the from an initial filing in 1948) that was comprehen-
fracture design and evaluation framework presented sive in scope and covered many recognized practices
in this volume. The industrys rapid contraction dur- and products: proppant, gelled oil, breakers, fluid-
ing the early 1980s resulted again from OPEC, but loss additives, continuous mixing, pad-acid fractur-
this time because of OPECs failure to maintain arti- ing, emulsified acids and the use of packers for frac-
ficially high prices. The TSO treatment for creating turing multiple zones. Several aspects of the patent
the very wide propped fractures required for high that later became important included the implication
permeability evolved during this time. This tech- that fractures were horizontal and the use of a low-
nique allowed the development of a troublesome penetrating fluid or with viscosity > 30 cp.
soft-chalk reservoir in the North Sea by fracturing. The first experimental treatments were performed
However, the significant potential of the TSO gener- in 1947 on four carbonate zones in the Houghton
ation did not materialize until about 10 years later, field in Kansas (Howard and Fast, 1970). The zones
when its application was required on a relatively had been previously acidized and were isolated by a
large scale to achieve viable economics for two high- cup-type straddle packer as each was treated with
permeability applications: bypassing deep damage in 1000 gal of napalm-thickened gasoline followed by
the Prudhoe Bay field and its coupling with gravel 2000 gal of gasoline as a breaker. These unpropped
A5-2 Chapter 5 Appendix: Evolution of Hydraulic Fracturing Design and Evaluation

treatments did not increase production and led to the worthy design and evaluation methods from this gen-
incorrect belief for some time that fracturing had no eration are fracture orientation (horizontal or verti-
benefit over acidizing for carbonate formations. cal), in-situ stress and fracture width models, FOI
A subsequent treatment of the Woodbine sand in prediction and fracture conductivity in production
the East Texas field was highly successful. It con- enhancement.
sisted of 23 bbl of gelled lease crude, 160 lbm of
16-mesh sand at 0.15 ppa and 24 bbl of breaker
(Farris, 1953). Halliburton originally obtained an Fracture orientation and in-situ stress
exclusive license from Stanolind and commercial- The application of mechanics to fracturing was cat-
ized fracturing in 1949. Activity rapidly expanded to alyzed by the horizontal orientation of fractures
about 3000 treatments per month by 1955 (Appendix implied in the Stanolind patent and the desire of sev-
Fig. 1a). Before a universal license was granted to eral operators to avoid paying the nominal patent
other service companies, water or river fracturing royalty of $25$125, based on volume (C. R. Fast,
became popular in lower permeability areas such as pers. comm., 1997). Significant research activity was
the San Juan basin (C. R. Fast, pers. comm., 1997). conducted to show that fractures can be vertical, as is
As implied by the name, the treatments used river now known to be the general case for typical fractur-
water and sand. The water was outside the definition ing conditions. The fracture orientation debate even-
of a nonpenetrating fluid within the patents specified tually led to a lawsuit that was settled before the trial
filtrate rate through filter paper or viscosity greater ended. The settlement accepted the patent and nomi-
than 30 cp. nal royalty payments and stipulated that other service
companies receive a license to practice fracturing.
However, the royalty benefits were more than nomi-
The first generation: damage bypass nal to Stanolind because about 500,000 treatments
Applications of first-generation fracturing were pri- were performed during the 17-year period of the
marily small treatments to bypass near-wellbore patent (C. R. Fast, pers. comm., 1997). Key to
drilling fluid damage to formations with permeability the favorable settlement for Stanolind was its well-
in the millidarcy range. An inherent advantage of documented demonstration of a horizontal fracture
propped fracturing, relative to matrix treatment for in the Pine Island field (see fig. 7-1 in Howard and
damage removal, is that a fracture opens the com- Fast, 1970).
plete section and retains a conductive path into the The central issue in the orientation debate was the
zone. The complete opening overcomes the diversion direction of the minimum stress. The pressure
consideration for matrix treatments (see Chapter 19), required to extend a fracture must exceed the stress
but adds the consideration of producing from bot- acting to close the fracture. Therefore, the fracture
tomwater or an upper gas cap. For lower permeability preferentially aligns itself perpendicular to the direc-
formations, large amounts of produced water are tion of minimum stress because this orientation pro-
generally not a problem. For higher permeability for- vides the lowest level of power to propagate the frac-
mations, water production can be significant, which ture. The minimum stress direction is generally hori-
provided the historical preference for matrix treat- zontal; hence, the fracture plane orientation is gener-
ment in higher permeability applications. However, ally vertical (i.e., a vertical fracture). The preference
the precision of fracturing improved significantly, for a horizontal fracture requires a vertical minimum
and TSO treatments have been routinely performed stress direction.
in Prudhoe Bay oil columns only 50 ft thick and In the following review, the orientation considera-
above very mobile water (Martins et al., 1992b). tion is expanded to also cover the state of stress in
The technology for this fracturing generation is more general terms. The stress at any point in the var-
summarized in the Howard and Fast (1970) Mono- ious rock layers intersected by the fracture is defined
graph. The breadth of this volume is shown by its by its magnitude in three principal and perpendicular
comprehensive consideration of candidate selection directions. The stress state defines not only the frac-
(see Chapter 1) and optimal design based on eco- ture orientation, but also the fluid pressure required to
nomic return (see Chapters 5 and 10). Other note- propagate a fracture that has operational importance,
vertical fracture growth into surrounding formation

layers and stress acting to crush proppant or to close Harrison et al. also reported the Sneddon and
etched channels from acid fracturing. The crushing Elliott (1946) width relation for an infinitely extend-
stress is the minimum stress minus the bottomhole ing pressurized slit contained in an infinitely extend-
flowing pressure in the fracture. The orientation ing elastic material. This framework has become the
debate resulted in three papers that will remain signifi- basis for predicting fracture width and fracturing
cant well into the future. pressure response (see Chapters 5, 6 and 9). They
The first paper to be considered is by Harrison et used the fracture length for the characteristic, or
al. (1954). Some of the important points in the paper smaller and finite, dimension in this relation. Sel-
are that the overburden stress (vertical stress v) is ecting the length for the characteristic dimension
about 1 psi per foot of depth, fracturing pressures are resulted in what is now commonly termed the KGD
generally lower than this value and therefore frac- model. Selecting the height, as is the case for a very
tures are not horizontal, and an inference from elas- long fracture, is termed the PKN model. These mod-
ticity that the minimum horizontal stress is els are discussed in the next section and Chapter 6.
Harrison et al. considered a width relation because
h = Ko v , (1) of its role in fracture design to determine the fluid
volume required for a desired fracture extent.
where Ko = /(1 ) = 13 for = 14 (see Eq. 3-51). The role of volume balance (or equivalently, the
Using Poissons ratio of 14, Harrison et al. con- material balance in reservoir terminology) is an
cluded that the horizontal stress is about one-third of essential part of fracture design and fracture simula-
the vertical stress and therefore fractures are vertical. tion code. As shown schematically on the left side of
Appendix Eq. 1 provides the current basis for using Appendix Fig. 2, each unit of fluid injected Vi is
mechanical properties logs to infer horizontal stress, either stored in the fracture to create fracture volume
with Poissons ratio obtained from a relation based or lost to the formation as fluid loss. (However,
on the shear and compressional sonic wave speeds Harrison et al.s 1954 paper does not discuss fluid
(see Chapter 4). Another assumption for Appendix loss.) The stored volume is the product of twice the
Eq. 1 is uniaxial compaction, based on the premise fracture half-length L, height hf and width w. If the
that the circumference of the earth does not change latter two dimensions are not constant along the frac-
as sediments are buried to the depths of petroleum ture length, they can be appropriately averaged over
reservoirs and hence the horizontal components of the length. The half-length is then obtained by sim-
strain are zero during this process. Therefore, Ap- ply dividing the remaining volume, after removing
pendix Eq. 1 provides the horizontal stress response the fluid-loss volume, by twice the product of the
to maintain the horizontal dimensions of a unit cube
constant under the application of vertical stress.
Vi
However, there is one problem with this 1954 L=
conclusion concerning horizontal stress. Appendix 2hf (w + CL 8t )
Eq. 1 is correct for the effective stress but not for

2hf wL
the total stress that governs fracture propagation: =
Vi
= p, where p is the pore pressure, which also Fluid loss
has a role in transferring the vertical stress into hori- CL t
Proppant
zontal stress as explicitly shown by Appendix Eq. 2.

Harrison et al. (1954) correctly postulated that shales
Geometry
have higher horizontal stresses and limit the vertical Proppant
(% area = )
fracture height. The general case of higher stress in hf 2L w
shales than in reservoir rocks was a necessary condi-
Pad
tion for the successful application of fracturing
Volume
because fractures follow the path of least stress. If
the converse were the general case, fractures would Appendix Figure 2. Volume balance for fracture place-
prefer to propagate in shales and not in reservoir ment (equation from Harrington et al., 1973) (adapted
zones. courtesy of K. G. Nolte and M. B. Smith, 19841985 SPE
Distinguished Lecture).

average height and the average width. The fluid-loss Hubbert and Willis also provided an important set
volume depends on the fluid-loss surface area, or a of postulates: the rock stresses within the earth are
height-length product. Furthermore, as shown on the defined by rock failure from tectonic action and the
right side of Appendix Fig. 2, the ratio of stored to earth is in a continuous state of incipient faulting.
total volume is termed the fluid efficiency and dir- From this perspective, the stress is not governed
ectly affects the proppant additional schedule (Har- by the behavior of the intact rock matrix, but by an
rington et al., 1973; Nolte, 1986b) (see Sidebar 6L). active state of failure along discrete boundaries (e.g.,
The second paper to be discussed from the orienta- by sand grains within fault boundaries, which
tion era is by Hubbert and Willis (1957). The lessons explains the application of Appendix Eq. 2 to micro-
from this paper extend beyond fracturing and into darcy-permeability sandstones). This insightful con-
the area of structural geology. This work provides clusion about the role of failure is at the other
simple and insightful experiments to define the state extreme of the behavior spectrum from the elastic
of in-situ stress and demonstrate a fractures prefer- assumptions that Poissons ratio (Appendix Eq. 1)
ence to propagate in the plane with minimum stress governs the horizontal stress and that failure has no
resistance. For the latter experiments, the forma- effect on the stress. This extreme difference in the
tion was gelatin within a plastic bottle preferentially assumptions for Appendix Eqs. 1 and 2 is often
stressed to create various planes of minimal stress. overlooked because of the similar value of Ko = ~13
They also used simple sandbox experiments to obtained in the case of a tectonically relaxed region
demonstrate normal and thrust faulting and to define and Poissons ratio near 14. However, the role of elas-
the state of stress for these conditions (see Sidebar ticity becomes important in thrusting areas (see
3A). They showed that Ko, or equivalently the hori- Section 3-5.2) because of the difference in horizontal
zontal stress, within Appendix Eq. 1 is defined by stress resulting for layers with different values of
the internal friction angle ( = 30 for sand) and is Youngs modulus (stiffness). More of the tectonic
1
3 for the minimum stress during normal faulting and action and higher levels of stress are supported by the
3 for the maximum stress during thrust faulting. For stiffer layers.
the normal faulting case and correctly including pore Additional considerations for horizontal stress out-
pressure in Appendix Eq. 1, the total minimum hori- lined by Prats (1981) include the role of long-term
zontal stress becomes creep. Creep deformation allows relaxation of the
stress difference between the overburden and hori-
h = ( v + 2 p) 3 , (2) zontal stresses, thereby enabling the horizontal stress
to increase toward the larger vertical stress governed
where Ko = 13 with = 30. For this case the horizon- by the weight of the overburden. This effect is well
tal stress is much less than the vertical stress except known for salt layers that readily creep and can col-
in the extreme geopressure case of pore pressure lapse casing by transferring most of the larger over-
approaching overburden, which causes all stresses burden stress into horizontal stress. The role of stress
and pore pressure to converge to the overburden relaxation is an important mechanism for providing
stress. For the thrust faulting case, the larger horizon- favorable stress differences between relatively clean
tal stress (i.e., for the two horizontal directions) is sands governed by friction (i.e., Appendix Eq. 2) with
greater than the overburden and the smaller horizon- minimal creep and sediments with higher clay con-
tal stress is equal to or greater than the overburden. tent. In the latter case, the clay supports some of the
Both the extreme geopressure case and an active intergranular stresses. The clay structure is prone to
thrust faulting regime can lead to either vertical or creep that relaxes the in-situ stress differences and
horizontal fractures. The author has found Appendix increases the horizontal stress for a clay-rich formation.
Eq. 2 to accurately predict the horizontal stress in tec- Hence, both clay content and Poissons ratio pro-
tonically relaxed sandstone formations ranging from duce the same effect on horizontal stress. Because
microdarcy to darcy permeability. The accuracy at clay content also increases Poissons ratio, there is
the high range is not surprising, as the formations a positive correlation of clay content (creep-induced
approach the unconsolidated sand in the sandbox stress) to larger Poissons ratios (and elastic stress,
experiments. The accuracy obtained for microdarcy- from Appendix Eq. 1) inferred from sonic velocities.
permeability sands is subsequently explained. The implication of the correlation is that clay-rich

formations can also have horizontal stresses greater injection) and decreasing stress within the region
than those predicted by either Appendix Eq. 1 or 2, of decreasing pore pressure (e.g., production). The
which is consistent with the general requirement to long-term impact of Lubinskis paper is that the
calibrate elastic-based stress profiles to higher levels importance of poroelasticity increases as routine
of stress (e.g., Nolte and Smith, 1981). The correla- fracturing applications continue their evolution to
tion of clay and Poissons ratio links the conclusions higher permeability formations. This is apparent
of Hubbert and Willis and Prats that horizontal stress from the thermal analogyas the area of expansion
is governed primarily by nonelastic effects and the increases the induced stresses also increase. For
general correlation between the actual stress and poroelasticity, the area of significant transient change
elastic/sonic-based stress profiles. in pore pressure increases as the permeability
The third significant paper from this period is by increases (see Section 3-5.8).
Lubinski (1954). He was a Stanolind researcher who Appendix Fig. 3 shows an example of significant
introduced the role that poroelasticity can have in poroelasticity for a frac and pack treatment in a
generating larger stresses during fracturing. (Poro- 1.5-darcy oil formation. The time line for the figure
elasticity could increase horizontal stress and lead begins with two injection sequences for a linear-gel
to horizontal fractures, as in the Stanolind patent.) fluid and shows the pressure increasing to about
Lubinski presented poroelasticity within the context 7500 psi and reaching the pressure limit for the oper-
of its analogy to thermoelasticity. His use of the ther- ation. During the early part of the third injection
mal stress analogy facilitates understanding the poro- period, crosslinked fluid reaches the formation and
elastic concept because thermal stresses are generally the pressure drops quickly to about 5600 psi (the
more readily understood than pore stresses by engi- native fracturing pressure) and remains essentially
neers. The analogy provides that when pore pressure constant during the remainder of the injection.
is increased in an unrestrained volume of rock, the The first two injections, without a crosslinked-fluid
rock will expand in the same manner as if the tem- filtrate (or filter cake) to effectively insulate the for-
perature is increased. Conversely, when the pore mation (as in the thermal analogy) from the increas-
pressure is lowered, the rock will contract as if the ing injection pressure, resulted in pore pressure
temperature is lowered. When the rock is con- increases of significant magnitude and extent within
strained, as in a reservoir, a localized region of pore the formation. The pore pressure increase provides up
pressure change will induce stress changes: increas- to a 1900-psi horizontal and poroelasticity stress
ing stress within the region of increasing pore pres- increase that extends the fracturing pressure beyond
sure (e.g., from fracturing fluid filtrate or water the operational limit, leading to the shut-in for the
10,000 50
Linear gel Crosslinked gel
8000 Injection 40
Bottomhole pressure, BHP (psi)
Step rate
Linear gel
Injection rate (bbl/min)
6000 30
4000 20
Injection
Step rate Minifracture Propped fracture
2000 10
BHP
Injection rate
0 0
0 0.5 1.0 2.0 13.0 13.5 14.0
Time (hr)
Appendix Figure 3. High-permeability frac and pack treatment (Gulrajani et al., 1997b).

second injection. This increase is about one-third of large tip-region stresses to a level that can be accom-
the native stress. However, during the two subsequent modated by the in-situ condition. The presence of
injections the insulating effect of the crosslinked the lag region has been demonstrated by field experi-
fluids internal cake and filtrate allows fracture exten- ments at a depth of 1400 ft at the U.S. Department of
sion within essentially the native stress state. The Energy (DOE) Nevada Test Site (Warpinski, 1985).
pressure drop supported by the cake and filtrate is Appendix Fig. 4 compares the Khristianovich and
about 1300 psi, as reflected by the rapid pressure Zheltov analytical results for width and pressure to
decrease after the third injection. This decrease the corresponding parameters from the Warpinski
occurs because of the rapid closure and cessation of field results. For the analytical results, decreasing
fluid loss (that activated the pressure drop), which is values of the complex variable angle 0 toward the
the same reason that surface pressure decreases at the right side of the figure correspond to relatively
cessation of injection and loss of pipe friction. The smaller lag regions and larger differences between
last injection for the proppant treatment is also of the minimum stress and pressure in the lag region
interest because of the absence of a poroelastic effect (i.e., generally deeper formations). The width pro-
during the initial linear-gel injection. This observation files clearly show the clamping action at the tip, and
indicates that the insulating effect remained effective the field data appear to be represented by a 0 valve
from the prior injection of crosslinked fluid. of about /8 for the analytical cases. Also notewor-
For a normally pressured and tectonically relaxed thy of the experimental results is that tests 4 through
area, the maximum increase in horizontal stress 7 with water and test 9 with gel show similar behav-
before substantial fracture extension is about one- ior when test 4, which had a relatively low injection
third of the native horizontal stress (Nolte, 1997), rate, is ignored. Tests 10 and 11 were with a gelled
as was found for the case shown in Appendix Fig. fluid and clearly show progressively different behav-
3. Also, for any pore pressure condition in a relaxed ior from the preceding tests because of the altered tip
area, the stress increase will not cause the horizontal behavior resulting from prior gel injections and the
stress to exceed the overburden (i.e., cause horizontal residual gel filter cakes that fill the fracture aperture
fracturing). However, as the example shows, without after closure. The cakes have the consistency of sili-
fluid-loss control, poroelasticity can significantly con rubber and functionally provide an analogous
increase the fracturing pressure and extend it beyond sealing affect for subsequent tests.
operational limits for high-permeability reservoirs. The practical importance of the lag region cannot
be overemphasized. The extent of the region, which
is extremely small in comparison with commercial-
Width models scale fractures, adjusts to the degree required to
The first rigorous coupling of fluid flow and the elas- essentially eliminate the role of the rocks fracture
tic response of the formation was reported by resistance or toughness (e.g., see SCR Geomechanics
Khristianovich and Zheltov (1955). They used a two- Group, 1993) and to isolate the fluid path from all
dimensional (2D) formulation based on a complex but the primary opening within the multitude of
variable analysis. Their formulation was equivalent cracks (process zone) forming ahead of the fracture
to the length becoming the characteristic, or smaller, (see Chapters 3 and 6). The field data show the
dimension and provides the initial K for the KGD width at the fluid front is well established (i.e., gen-
width model discussed later and in Chapter 6. In erally greater than 5% of the maximum width at the
addition to being the first paper to provide the cou- wellbore) and that fluid enters only a well-established
pling of fluid flow and rock interaction that is the channel behind the complexity of the process zone.
embodiment of the hydraulic fracturing process, the These aspects of the lag region provide great simpli-
paper also identified the role for a fluid lag region at fication and increased predictablility for applying
the fracture tip. This low-pressure region, beyond the commercial-scale hydraulic fracturing processes.
reach of fracturing fluid and filling with pore fluid, A paper by Howard and Fast (1957), and particu-
has a large, negative net pressure and acts as a clamp larly the accompanying appendix by R. D. Carter,
at the fracture tip. The fluid lags clamping effect provides the current framework for fluid loss. The
provides the natural means to lower the potentially paper identifies the three factors controlling fluid
loss: filter-cake accumulation, filtrate resistance into

0.6
Test 1.0
4
5 0.9
0.5 6
7 0.8
9 0 = 3
16
0.4 10 0.7
11 0 =
8
0.6
0 = 3 0 =
w/wo
w/wo
0.3 8 16
0.5
0 =
Width at
fluid arrival 4
0.4
0.2
0.3
0.2
0.1
0.1
0 0
0.25 0.20 0.15 0.10 0.05 0 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1.0
Normalized distance from tip, (L x)/L Normalized distance from well, x/L
1.0 1.0
Test
4
5
0.8 6 0.8
0 =
7
9 8
10 0 = 3
0.6 8
0.6
p/po
p/po
0 =
16
0.4 0.4
0 =
4
0.2 0.2
0 = 3
16
0 0
0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
Normalized distance from tip, (L x)/L Normalized distance from well, x/L
Appendix Figure 4. Comparison of Warpinski (1985) field data (left) and Khristianovich and Zheltov (1955) analysis
(right). wo and po are the wellbore values of width and pressure, respectively; x is the distance from the well.
the reservoir and displacement of the reservoir fluid height and tip-to-tip length. This equation, based on
(see Fig. 5-17 and Chapters 6 and 8). All three fac- the assumption of a spatial and temporal constant
tors are governed by the relation 1/t (where t is fracture width, provided the first rigorous inclusion
time) for porous flow in one dimension. The coeffi- of fluid loss into the fracturing problem (see Chapter
cient for this relation was termed the fluid-loss coef- 6). Equation 6-18, which is solved by Laplace trans-
ficient CL. The authors also provided the means to formation, is in terms of exponential and comple-
determine the coefficient for all three factors using mentary error functions and is not engineer friendly.
analytical expressions for the filtrate and reservoir This difficulty was soon overcome by developing a
contributions and to conduct and analyze the filter- table for the more complicated terms in the equation
cake experiment, which is now an American Petro- using a dimensionless variable (see Eq. 6-19) that is
leum Institute (API) Recommended Practice. proportional to the fluid-loss coefficient (loss vol-
Also of significance was presentation of the Carter ume) divided by the width (stored volume) and
area equation, with area defined as the product of the hence also related directly to the fluid efficiency

illustrated in Appendix Fig. 2. Nomographs for The one shortcoming acknowledged by Perkins
the complete equation were also developed (e.g., and Kern was not rigorously accounting for the flow
figs. 4-17 and 4-18 of the Howard and Fast Mono- rate change in the fracture required by continuity
graph). Eventually a simple and approximate expres- (i.e., material balance). They assumed that the volu-
sion (Harrington et al., 1973) for the Carter equation metric flow rate was constant along the fractures
provided the basis for fracture design into the 1980s. length, which does not account for the effects of
The approximate expression is based on the relation fluid loss and local rates of width change (storage
at the top of Appendix Fig. 2. For these applications, change). This assumption was later addressed by
the average width was first determined from either the Nordgren (1972), who provided closed-form equa-
KGD or PKN model, as discussed in the following. tions for the bounding cases of negligible fluid loss
Another 1957 paper was by Godbey and Hodges and negligible fracture storage (i.e., most fluid
(1958) and provided the following prophetic phrases: injected is lost during pumping) for a long-aspect
By obtaining the actual pressure on the formation fracture and Newtonian fluid (see Section 6-2.2). The
during a fracture treatment, and if the inherent tec- initial letters of the last names of the authors of these
tonic stresses are known, it should be possible to two papers form the name of the PKN model.
determine the type of fracture induced. . . . The The remaining paper of historic importance for
observation of both the wellhead and bottomhole width modeling is by Geertsma and de Klerk (1969).
pressure during fracturing operations is necessary to They used the Carter area equation to include fluid
a complete understanding and possible improvement loss within the short-aspect fracture, as previously
of this process. These statements anticipated two of considered by Harrison et al. (1954) and Khristian-
the important enablers for the second generation of ovich and Zheltov (1955). Their initials coupled with
fracturing: the use of pressure in an manner analo- those of the authors of the latter paper form the name
gous to well test characterization of a reservoir and of the KGD (or KZGD) width model.
employment of a calibration treatment to improve
the subsequent proppant treatment (see Chapters 5,
9 and 10). Reservoir response to a fracture
In 1961 Perkins and Kern published their paper Until the advent of numerical simulators, production
on fracture width models, including the long aspect models for a fracture did not consider transient flow
ratio fracture (length significantly greater than height) effects and were based on the FOI relative to the
and radial model (tip-to-tip length about equal to reservoirs radial flow response with no damage (skin
height) as described in Section 6-2.2. They considered, effect = 0). The increase in production, relative to the
for the first time, both turbulent fluid flow and non- case before fracturing, can be significantly greater
Newtonian fluids (power law model) and provided than the FOI measure because fracturing also by-
validating experiments for radial geometry and the passes near-wellbore damage. The enhanced stimula-
role of rock toughness. tion benefit increases as the magnitude of the damage
Perkins and Kern also discussed fracture afterflow increases. For example, removing a skin effect of
that affects the final proppant distribution within the about 25 increases production by about a factor of 4,
fracture. After pumping stops, the stored compres- whereas during the first generation a typical FOI target
sion in the rock acts in the same fashion as com- was about 2, relative to zero skin effect.
pressible fluids in a wellbore after well shut-in. After Papers considering finite-conductive fractures
fracture shut-in, fluid flow continues toward the tip began to appear in 1958 and are summarized in chap-
until either proppant bridges the tip or fluid loss ter 10 of the Howard and Fast (1970) Monograph.
reduces the fracture width and stored compression Craft et al. (1962) considered the combined effects of
to the extent that the fracture length begins to recede fracture stimulation and damage bypass. Also of his-
toward the wellbore (Nolte, 1991). The magnitude torical interest is that most of this work was per-
of the fracture afterflow is large compared with the formed on analog computers with electrical circuits
wellbore storage case, as discussed later for representing the reservoir and fracture components.
Appendix Eq. 4. Recognition of the role of conductivity was important
because the idealized assumption of infinite conduc-

tivity, with no pressure loss in the proppant pack,

1.0
cannot result from an economics-based optimized rw = 0.5x f
treatment. The incremental production increase, by
Effective wellbore radius, rw/xf

0.5
1
achieving the infinite-acting case, would not offset 1 CfD = 30
k fw
the operational cost for the additional proppant. rw = 0.28
k
McGuire and Sikora (1960) presented a significant 0. 1
study of the production increase in a bounded reser-
voir for a fracture with a finite conductivity kf w for CfD =
k fw
kx f
the proppant pack, where kf is the fracture permeabil- CfD = 0.2
ity. The boundary and conductivity effects are sum-

marized in the set of pseudosteady-state curves 0.01
shown in Appendix Fig. 5. The curves reflect differ- 0.1 1.0 10 100
ent ratios of the fracture length relative to the Dimensionless fracture conductivity, CfD
drainage radius re, with the vertical axis reflecting
the FOI as J/Jo and the horizontal axis reflecting Appendix Figure 6. Effective wellbore radius versus
dimensionless fracture conductivity (Nolte and
dimensionless conductivity based on the drainage Economides, 1991, adapted from Cinco-Ley and
radius. The McGuire and Sikora curves were the pri- Samaniego-V., 1981b).
mary reservoir tool for fracture design and evalua-
tion until the late 1970s.
Prats (1961) used mathematical analyses to con- The effective wellbore radius, coupled with the radial
duct a comprehensive consideration of finite-conduc- flow equation, provides a powerful tool for efficiently
tivity fractures with the assumption of steady-state calculating the FOI, or negative skin effect, provided
flow (i.e., constant-pressure boundaries). He intro- by the fracture. Prats also considered fracture face
duced a dimensionless conductivity that is essen- damage (or skin effect) and provided an optimized
tially the inverse of the dimensionless fracture con- treatment based on a fixed amount of proppant.
ductivity commonly used for transient analyses (i.e.,
CfD = kf w/kxf = /2). Prats also introduced the con-
Treatment optimization
cept of an effective (or apparent) wellbore radius rw.
The effective radius allows describing the fracture Optimizing a fracture treatment is an essential part
response in terms of an enlarged wellbore radius of maximizing its benefit (see Chapters 5 and 10).
within the radial flow equation. This concept is illus- For this reason Prats (1961) optimization considera-
trated in Appendix Fig. 6 for pseudoradial flow tion is of historic importance, although proppant vol-
(adapted from Cinco-Ley and Samaniego-V., 1981b). ume is generally not a realistic criterion because
proppant cost is only part of the investment for a
fracture treatment (e.g., Veatch, 1986; Meng and
14 Brown, 1987). Prats proppant optimization condi-
L/re = 1
0.9
tion at CfD = 1.26 could be a practical target for
)
12 0.8
0.7
ln 0.472 rw
re
10 0.6 high-permeability reservoirs; however, this value is

7.13
8
0.5 about an order of magnitude lower than the optimum
0.4
case for the long transient period of a very low per-
6 0.3
meability reservoir.
(
4 0.2
Additional lessons are also provided by the appar-
(J/Jo)
0.1
2 entwellbore concept. The first is that a fracture is
0 equivalent to enlarging the wellbore and not increas-
102 103 104 105 106 ing the formations global permeability. Incorrectly
kfw 40 considering a fracture to be a permeability increase
Relative conductivity,
k A can lead to incorrect conclusions concerning reser-
voir recovery and waterflood sweep. Another insight
Appendix Figure 5. McGuire and Sikora (1960) curves for
folds of increase (J/Jo) in a bounded reservoir of area A
is the generally favorable economics for an effec-
(acres). tively designed and executed fracture. A fracture

treatment is equivalent to excavating a very large Transition between the first and
diameter borehole (e.g., hundreds of feet in most
cases) and therefore is an extremely cost-effective second generations
way to provide an equivalent excavation. By 1961, the design and evaluation tools for most
The most important optimization lesson is found of the next two decades had been established by the
in Appendix Fig. 6 for the roles of conductivity kf w contributions discussed. Incremental development of
(achieved by proppant cost) and fracture penetration these tools slowed because fracturing was considered
(achieved by fluid and other additive costs; see a mature technology. Also affecting technical devel-
Chapter 7). The figure indicates that as CfD increases opment was the degrading economics for lower qual-
beyond 10, the effective wellbore radius approaches ity reserves as oil import-export increased and frac-
one-half of the fracture length and there are dimin- turing activity decreased (Appendix Fig. 1). This
ishing returns for additional increases in conductivity condition did not change until the mid-1970s
(i.e., incurring proppant costs without an effective brought natural gas shortages and higher gas prices
increase in production rate). For this part of Appen- to the United States. Higher prices produced the
dix Fig. 6, the effective radius is constrained only incentive to develop extensive regions of tight gas
by length and is termed the length-limited case. reserves with fractures targeting the FOI = 10 range
However, increasing both fracture length and con- of the McGuire and Sikora curves (Appendix Fig. 5).
ductivity to maintain a constant CfD achieves the Before this period, typical fracturing targets were oil
most efficient conversion of length into an effective reservoirs with an FOI of about 2, with FOI relative
wellbore radius. This conversion is the basis for to an undamaged wellbore. However the FOI = 10
effectively fracturing low-permeability formations. target required about an order-of-magnitude increase
The practical limits for the length-limited case are in the volume and cost for a typical treatment and
reaching the drainage radius, increasing conductivity was hence termed massive hydraulic fracturing.
within the limits of achievable fracture width and This new target introduced higher temperature
efficiently extending a fracture when the pressure reservoirs, typically of tight gas, that generally
reaches the formation capacity, as discussed later. As exceeded the performance limits for fracturing fluid
permeability increases, and proportionally decreases systems. These conditions stretched the so-called
CfD, the ability to increase conductivity becomes mature technology in almost every conceivable way
the constraint. As CfD progressively decreases, the and resulted in a bumpy journey because of the pro-
conductivity-limited case is reached. The figure indi- portionally large economic penalty when a treatment
cates that as CfD decreases below 1, a log-log unit failed to meet expectations. However, reports of suc-
slope is approached that relates rw to kf w/k, with the cessful field development (e.g., Fast et al., 1977)
obvious absence of an effect from length. When the encouraged continued interest in tight gas develop-
unit slope is reached, near a value of 0.2, the well- ment.
bore drawdown completely dissipates within the
fracture before reaching the tip, and the extremities
of the fracture cannot provide a production benefit. Realistic estimate of conductivity
For the conductivity-limited condition, the produc- Cooke (1975) reported realistic experiments for char-
tion rate can be increased economically only by pro- acterizing the conductivity of proppant packs. His
viding more conductivity kf w, with an obvious con- procedure formed proppant packs from a slurry com-
straint from the available fracture width developed posed of polymer-based fluids by using a cell with
during the treatment. This constraint was significantly rock faces that allowed fluid loss and the subsequent
extended by the third fracturing generation of TSO application of closure stress. The Cooke cell is now
treatments, which is discussed toward the end of this a standard apparatus for a fracturing fluid laboratory
Appendix.

(see Chapter 8). The experiments showed that the infinitely above and below the pay section with each
retained pack permeability could be very small. barrier having the same magnitude of stress). The
These results were unexpected because prior testing three-layer case provided insight into how to adapt
procedures did not use fracturing fluids or stress lev- more general relations to any number of layers (e.g.,
els for deeper gas reserves. The primary difference Nolte and Smith, 1981; chapter 3 of Gidley et al.,
resulted because the rock acts as a polymer screen 1989). These relations led to the calculations employed
at moderate and smaller permeability levels, which in pseudo-three-dimensional (P3D) fracture simulators
significantly increases the polymer concentration (see Section 6-3.2).
remaining within the proppant pack porosity after Novotny (1977) outlined a comprehensive basis for
fracture closure. proppant transport calculations and in particular identi-
Cooke also provided a simple mass-balance rela- fied the important roles of channel shear rate and frac-
tion for this important consideration. The concen- ture closure in determining the ultimate placement of
tration factor for the polymer and other additives proppant (see Section 6-5.3. Both effects produce more
remaining in the fracture relative to the original proppant fall. For non-Newtonian fluids, the effective
concentration can be expressed as viscosity for sedimentation is determined from the vec-
toral sum of the shear rate in the channel and that
CF = 44 / ppa , (3) caused by proppant fall (as for stagnant fluid). This
for a typical proppant pack porosity of 0.33 and sum is generally dominated by the channel flow and
proppant specific gravity (s.g.) of 2.65. The relation is much greater than that for a particle in stagnant fluid
depends on the average concentration <ppa> defined (i.e., higher shear rate and lower viscosity). In addition,
as the total pounds of proppant divided by the total the closure period prolongs the time for proppant fall
gallons of polymer-based fluid. This relation indicates and maintains the channel flow to reduce the effective
a polymer concentration increase of 20 or greater for viscosity. Novotny also provided a brief analysis of the
typical treatments at that time (e.g., <ppa> of 1 to volume balance during closure, which is the essential
2 lbm). This unexpected discovery of a significant ingredient for the fracturing pressure decline analysis
reduction in retained permeability, coupled with the (e.g., Nolte, 1979) that is used for calibration treat-
prior discussion on conductivity and effective well- ments (see Section 9-5).
bore radius, partly explains the difficult transition to
massive treatments.
Cookes pioneering work had obvious effects on Transient reservoir response
proppant schedules for treatments and laboratory The FOI consideration for fracture production was
testing procedures. Equally important, the work initi- found to be completely inadequate for the substantial
ated substantial product development activities, as period of transient flow that occurs in tight formations
discussed in Chapter 7. These include improved (see Section 12-2). The first tool for finite-conductivity
proppants, beginning with Cookes work on bauxite transient flow was type curves provided by Agarwal
for high crushing stress, improved breaker chemistry et al. (1979). Although these curves were developed
and breaker encapsulation, large reductions of poly- from numerical simulators, access to computers was
mer concentration for crosslinked fluids, foams and generally outside the reach of most engineers. These
emulsions, and residue-free viscoelastic surfactant and similar type curves became the standard evalua-
systems. The evolution of fracturing fluid chemistry tion tool to assess production from a fracture treat-
was reviewed by Jennings (1996). ment. Type curves were also used for optimizing treat-
ment design. By the mid-1980s, as general access to
computers increased, the use of type curves began to
Height growth and proppant transport decrease accordingly.
Simonson et al. (1978) presented the mechanics gov- Cinco-Ley and Samaniego-V. (1981b) provided
erning fracture growth into a layer with higher stress, several advancements for understanding and quanti-
complementing the postulate by Harrison et al. (1954) fying the transient behavior of a reservoir fracture
concerning the role of stress for height confinement. system. In addition to advancing the effective well-
The analysis considered a three-layer case for two bore concept (e.g., Appendix Fig. 6) and type curves,
symmetric barriers (i.e., two barriers extending they identified and provided comprehensive descrip-

tions for the distinctive transient regimes resulting These advancements and insight from Bennett
from a finite-conductivity fracture (see Section 12-2). et al. (1986) for layered formations provide a solid
The bilinear flow regime, generally the first to foundation for the reservoir response to fracturing.
occur during production or a well test, was para-
mount for bridging the gap between fracture design
and subsequent evaluation based on production or The second generation:
well tests. For permeability in the range of 10 d, the
bilinear period can last on the order of a year or more
massive fracturing
for a long fracture (>2500 ft from the well). During As indicated in the preceding section, the bumpy
bilinear flow the stabilized pressure drawdown pro- road to successful massive fracturing also included
gresses along the fracture length. During this period, massive penalties because the cost of a fracture treat-
it is not possible to determine the length of the frac- ment could become equivalent to the well cost. The
ture from a well test or production data because the combined effect of many companies experiencing
total length has not had time to effectively experience $500,000 treatments that did not provide commercial
the wellbore drawdown. Therefore, a meaningful wells resulted in a significant investment for fractur-
evaluation for fracture length cannot be obtained until ing research. One result of this effort is the SPE
the bilinear period ends and the transient response Monograph Recent Advances in Hydraulic Frac-
progresses toward pseudoradial flow (potentially sev- turing (Gidley et al., 1989). The manuscripts for this
eral years). An obvious implication in this case is that comprehensive volume, with more than 30 contribu-
a standard well test cannot be used to determine frac- tors, were completed in 1984, only five years after
ture length; the length can be determined only from the 1979 SPE annual meeting provided the first
long-term production data. They also identified meaningful number of papers from this research
another important aspect of bilinear flow that occurs effort. The papers presented at this meeting were
because of the transient flow condition within the significant also because they presented a key that
proppant pack: the fracture conductivity can be char- enabled the reliable application of massive fracturing
acterized, independent of length and hence most reli- and rapid progression of the treatment size record
ably, by the slope of a plot of pressure versus the from 2 million lbm in 1979 to more than 7 million
quarter-root of time. lbm by 1986.
Recognition of these consequences for bilinear The key was that, for the first time in its 30-year
flow also explains the difficult transition to the suc- history, fracturing was considered in a framework
cessful application of massive treatments. Well test similar to that used for reservoir characterization.
interpretations misinformed instead of informed. The reservoir framework consists of pressure tran-
They indicated relatively short fracture lengths that sient analysis for the flow characteristics, wireline
were assumed to be treatment placement failures and logs for the formation parameters and geophysics
led to the common and contradicting result: how can for the macroview. The 1979 papers include the fol-
1 million lbm of sand be contained in a fracture lowing (a different reference year indicates the publi-
length of only 100 ft? Much longer propped lengths cation date):
were later substantiated by production data after the Logging: Rosepiler (1979) introduced application
bilinear period had ended (e.g., values of fracture of the long-spaced sonic tool to infer stress in dif-
half-length xf > 5000 ft; Roberts, 1981). Another ferent layers (see prior discussion of stress con-
contribution to incorrect interpretations was ignoring cerning Appendix Eq. 2 and Chapter 4). Dobkins
Cookes (1975) report of very low retained-pack per- (1981) presented improved cased hole logging
meability, which led to overly optimistic estimates of procedures for inferring the fracture height that
conductivity and proportionally pessimistic estimates were also used by Rosepiler to qualitatively vali-
of length. The coupling of these two factors pro- date his novel use of mechanical property logs.
duced incorrect and negative assessments for many
early attempts to establish massive fracturing as a Pressure transient analysis (PTA): Nolte and Smith
viable means of developing tight gas formations. (1981) introduced the role of pumping pressures by

using a log-log plot as a diagnostic tool (similar to width prediction, provides an analog of the reservoir
PTA practice) for fracture growth characteristics, pressure and reflects the height-averaged minimum
the role of pressure simulation for quantifying stress for the pay zone (see Sidebar 9A). The frac-
geometry (including height growth) and the role of ture width is proportional to the net pressure. The
calibrated stress profiles obtained from mechanical data in Appendix Fig. 7, one of the first recordings
property logs. Nolte (1979) introduced the role of of bottomhole pressure during a treatment, are simi-
pressure during the postinjection closing period to lar to the reservoir response for an injection test with
quantify fluid loss and predict fracture width and a pressure increase (pumping) and subsequent falloff
length by using a specialized time function in a (closing). The injection pressure is governed by the
manner analogous to the Horner plot. The combi- evolving fracture geometry, and the closure data are
nation of these two papers provided a foundation governed by the fluid loss. These two conditions,
for the common use of the calibration treatment respectively, enable characterizing the stored and lost
and pressure-history matching for defining design components of the volume-balance equation shown
parameters (see Chapter 9). Appendix Fig. 7 illus- in Appendix Fig. 2. After closure, the pressure is
trates the fracturing pressure for three distinct phas- independent of the fracture parameters and depends
es: pumping, closing and the after-closure period. on the reservoir response to the fluid lost during the
treatment.
Geophysics: Smith (1979) introduced the role of
The fundamental analogy between reservoir and
mapping fracture trajectories by using surface tilt-
fracturing behavior results because a diffusion-type
meters and borehole passive seismic techniques to
process governs both behaviors. The respective reser-
improve reservoir recovery by the correct place-
voir and fracturing equivalents are kh/ w2h/
ment of infill wells (see Section 12-1).
(transmissibility), where k is the permeability, h is the
A companion paper in 1980 showed the synergis- reservoir thickness, w is the width, and is the
tic benefit when these individual considerations are appropriate fluid viscosity, and ct h/(wE) 1/pnet
unified for tight gas exploitation (Veatch and (storage capacity of the reservoir), where is the
Crowell, 1982). porosity, ct is the total system compressibility, and E
is the formations elastic modulus. The last expres-
sion for storage contains an inverse proportionality to
Pressure from bottomhole bomb
Inferred pressure
the net fracture pressure pnet. This can be written in
terms of the fracture volume Vf, fluid pressure pf and
Bottomhole pressure, pw (psi)
9000 Fracture Pressure decline

treatment Fracture Transient reservoir closure pressure pc.
closing pressure near wellbore
8000
Fracture closes on 1 dVf 1 1
Net fracture
pressure proppant at well = = (4)
7000 pnet = pw pc Vf dp f pnet p f pc
Closure pressure
pc = horizontal rock stress
6000
Reservoir pressure 1 dw 1
= for constant h and L. (5)
5000 w dpnet pnet
38 40 42 44 46 48 50 56 58
Clock time (hr) This equation implies that the elastic formation,
compressed to contain the fractures volume, pro-
Appendix Figure 7. Bottomhole fracturing pressure
(Nolte, 1982). duces a system compressibility analogous to an equal
volume of perfect gas at a pressure equal to the frac-
tures net pressure. The result is a significant storage
capacity considering typical conditions with more
Fracturing pressure: analog of reservoir than 1000 bbl for fracture volume and only hundreds
response of pounds per square inch for net pressure. The last
An important component of fracturing pressure storage relation, for constant lateral dimensions, is
analysis is the closure pressure. The closure pressure important for a TSO, as discussed later.
is the datum for the net pressure that constrains the

Fracture simulators wells (Warpinski et al., 1996; see Section 12-1). The
importance of these measurements for fracture design
Describing a hydraulic fracture produces a signifi- and evaluation cannot be overemphasized. Indepen-
cantly more complex role for the diffusive process dent measurements for each component of the frac-
than the reservoir case because the basic parameter ture volume (Appendix Fig. 2) provide a long-awaited
groups change continuously with time, with a nonlin- benchmark for validating fracture models.
earity for the equivalent permeability, and the far- Like the first generations failure to find a consen-
field elastic coupling between width and pressure sus for width models (e.g., Perkins, 1973), pressure-
produces local parameters that have a general depen- history matching could not resolve the second gener-
dence on the pressure everywhere within the frac- ations conflicting adaptations of the P3D framework
tures unknown boundaries. For these reasons, frac- (see Chapter 6). The convergence of modeling
ture simulators that rigorously and robustly couple assumptions failed for several reasons. The first was
these parameters in a general manner (see Section fundamental to the pressure-matching process and
6-3) have not progressed at the same rate as reservoir results because of the multitude of opportunities for
simulators. nonuniqueness. Another reason was the failure to
The modeling difficulties led to widespread use of achieve a dominant industry opinion on either the
simulators based on P3D assumptions that partially technique or procedures for a specific technique to
circumvent the far-field elastic-coupling condition. define closure pressure (e.g., Plahn et al., 1997). This
The two most common means were relaxing the lat- state of affairs allowed selecting a closure pressure
eral coupling in the long direction of the fracture (as procedure to validate particular modeling assump-
for the PKN model) to allow a cellular representation tions and therefore justify relatively arbitrary and ad
and vertical height growth of the cells (e.g., Nolte, hoc modeling assumptions. Techniques to determine
1982) or prescribing the boundary and width profiles the closure pressure are discussed in Section 3-6 and
by elliptical segments and a lumped dependence on the Appendix to Chapter 9.
the governing parameters (e.g., Settari and Cleary, Because of nonuniqueness in the reservoir response
1986). P3D models, or more precisely P2D models, and the basing of reservoir models on overly idealized
evolved to include automated proppant scheduling modeling assumptions for a fracture, the reservoir
and the temperature-exposure history for polymer and response cannot generally provide an effective
additive scheduling (e.g., Nolte, 1982), acid fractur- constraint on the achieved fracture length (Elbel and
ing (e.g., Mack and Elbel, 1994), economic optimiza- Ayoub, 1991; Nolte and Economides, 1991). Mapping
tion for treatment design (e.g., Veatch 1986; Meng constraints on all three fracture dimensions provide a
and Brown, 1987), automated pressure-history match- unique, objective test of the geometry model assump-
ing (e.g., Gulrajani and Romero, 1996; Gulrajani et tions (e.g., Gulrajani et al., 1997a) and a basis for
al., 1997b) and rigorous 2D slurry flow (e.g., Smith rationally judging and selecting the model complexity
and Klein, 1995). appropriate for the specific application, available data
Originally restricted to in-office use, these models and simulation resources.
merged with on-site fracture monitoring systems to
provide treatment evaluation and simulation in real-
time mode. An equally important advance was the Treatment design and evaluation
parallel evolution of process-controlled mixing and
blending equipment for reliable execution of more The primary fracture evaluation advance from the
demanding treatment schedules and progressively massive treatment generation is the calibration treat-
more complex chemistry that requires precise pro- ment performed before the proppant treatment to
portioning (see Chapters 7 and 11). define placement parameters. Combining the calibra-
tion treatment and the purpose-designed TSO treat-
ment produced the primary treatment innovation of
Fracture mapping and model validation the second generation. The calibrated TSO treat-
ment, developed by Smith et al. (1984), became the
An important achievement was the definition of frac- key to the third fracturing generation (discussed
ture length, height and width by employing passive later) and essentially removed width as a constraint
seismic measurements and tiltmeters in observation for the conductivity required to successfully fracture

very high permeability formations. This capability

Field Data
and timing produced the overly optimistic prediction
in 1985 for the beginning of the TSO generation, as Variable injection rate
Net pressure, pnet (psi)

2000
indicated by Appendix Fig. 1a. Proppant
begins II III-a
I
Transition between the second and

1000 * Proppant
begins
x
II
III-b
[5 MPa] II IV
third generations I
III-a
500
The following paragraphs link several aspects of the 40 60 100 200 400 600 1000
massive and TSO generations by using the informa- Time (min)
tion available from the diagnostic log-log plot for
fracturing in Appendix Fig. 8. Appendix Table 1 lists
Idealized Data
the interpretations for various slopes exhibited in the III-b
figure by the net pressure during fracturing. The data
log pnet
II
III-a
I
are from two massive treatments in tight gas forma- IV
tions. The top curve is a treatment in the Wattenberg Inefficient extension for
pnet formation capacity pfc
field, the first microdarcy-permeability field develop-
ment (Fast et al., 1977). The behavior shown by the log time or volume
lower treatment curve, which was designed by this
author, provided insight for developing the TSO Appendix Figure 8. Log-log diagnostic plot for fracturing
(Nolte, 1982).
treatment that enables successfully fracturing darcy-
scale oil formations. The treatment related to the
lower curve was not particularly successful. How- capacity. The capacity (Nolte, 1982) defines the pres-
ever, it was one of the first 2 million lbm treatments sure limit for efficient fracture extension and is anal-
and hence functioned better as a sand-disposal ogous to the pressure-capacity rating for a pressure
treatment than a gas-stimulation treatment. The sand vessel. The cited reference has an unsurprising
was disposed of with 900,000 gal of crosslinked fluid theme of the negative effects of excesses of pressure,
containing 90 lbm/1000 gal of polymer, or approxi- polymer and viscosity.
mately 80,000 lbm of polymer. Three mechanisms for a formation can define its
The marginal success of the treatment is readily pressure capacity before rupture accelerates fluid
understood by considering Appendix Eq. 3. For the loss from the formations pay zone. The subsequent
treatment average of 2.1 ppa, the equation predicts fluid loss also leaves proppant behind to further
1900 lbm/1000 gal crosslinked fluid (in reality, a enhance slurry dehydration and proppant bridging.
solid) remaining in the proppant pack porosity after Each mechanism is defined by the in-situ stress state
the treatment. However, the size and viscosity for and results in a constant injection pressure condition,
this treatment provided an ideal test condition of or zero log-log slope, when the net pressure reaches
how a formation responds to fluid pressure and an the mechanisms initiation pressure. The mecha-
excellent illustration for the concept of formation nisims are
Appendix Table 1. Slopes of fracturing pressures and their interpretation in Appendix Fig. 8.
Type Approximate log-log slope value Interpretation
I 8 to 14
1
Restricted height and unrestricted expansion
II 0 Height growth through pinch point, fissure opening
or T-shaped fracture
III-a 1 Restricted tip extension (two active wings)
III-b 2 Restricted extension (one active wing)
IV Negative Unrestricted height growth

opening the natural fissures in the formation, gov- the required penetration could be obtained by not
erned by the difference in the horizontal stresses exceeding the formation capacity. A subsequent treat-
ment designed using 150,000 gal and 900,000 lbm of
extending the height through a vertical stress bar-
sand (an average of 6 ppa) became the prototype for
rier and into a lower stress (and most likely per-
the remaining development of the field (Nolte, 1982).
meable) zone, governed by the difference in the
The lower curve on Appendix Fig. 8 is for the
horizontal stress for the barrier and pay zone
aforementioned sand-disposal treatment in the Cot-
initiating a horizontal fracture component when ton Valley formation of East Texas. As previously
the pressure increases to exceed the level of the discussed, the treatment provided an opportunity to
overburden stress. observe a large range of fracturing behavior with five
An important observation for the pressure capacity types of interpretive slopes occurring, including
is that it depends on the in-situ stress state and there- Type I indicating extension with restricted height
fore does not change for the formation in other well growth
locations unless there are significant local tectonic
effects. As a result, all future treatments for the field Type II defining this formations lowest pressure
can generally be effectively designed on the basis of capacity at 1000 psi for the penetration of a stress
only one bottomhole pressure recording and its barrier
detailed analysis (see Section 9-4). Type IV, with decreasing pressure, indicating unre-
The upper curve on Appendix Fig. 8, for the stricted vertical growth through a lower stress
Wattenberg treatment, illustrates the fissure-opening zone after the barrier was penetrated.
mechanism with the Type II zero slope occurring at
a net pressure of 1700 psi. This value provides one of The Type IV condition continued until proppant
the largest formation capacities ever reported. The fis- was introduced. Almost immediately after proppant
sure opening is preceded by restricted height growth entered the fracture the pressure increased, most
and unrestricted extension (Type I slope) that provide likely because the proppant bridged vertically in the
the most efficient mode of fracture extension. There- width pinch point formed by the penetrated stress
fore, conditions in this formation are favorable for barrier and restricted additional height growth.
propagating a massive fracture; not by coincidence, During the preceding 6-hr period of significant verti-
this was the first field successfully developed in the cal growth, the horizontal growth was retarded. As a
massive treatment generation (Fast et al., 1997), and it result, the very high polymer concentration formed a
provided incentive to continue the development of thick polymer filter cake at the fracture tip that proba-
massive treatment technology. Returning to Appendix bly restricted further horizontal extension. Thus, the
Fig. 8, after the period of constant pressure and extremities of the fracture were restricted either by
enhanced fluid loss, a Type III-a slope for a fracture proppant or polymer cake, and continued injection
screenout occurs because slurry dehydration forms was stored by increasing width indicated by the Type
frictional proppant bridges that stop additional exten- III-a unit slope. After a significant increase in pres-
sion (i.e., a generally undesired screenout for a tight sure, the pressure became constant for a short period
formation requiring fracture length over conductivity). at 1200 psi with a Type II slope that probably resulted
After the penetration is arrested, the major portion of from opening natural fissures to define a second,
the fluid injected is stored by increasing width (see higher capacity. Subsequently the slope increased to
Appendix Eq. 4) and the net pressure develops the unit an approximately 2:1 slope indicated as Type III-b.
slope characteristic of storage. The amount of width This latter slope for a storage mechanism indicates
increase is proportional to the net pressure increase. that about one-half of the fracture area had become
The Wattenberg treatment consisted of 300,000 gal restricted to flow, which could have resulted from one
of fluid and 600,000 lbm of sand with an average wing of the fracture being blocked to flow near the
concentration of 2 ppa, similar to the previous exam- well because of slurry dehydration from the fissure
ple. However, the treatment was successful because fluid loss. The wellbore region experiences the largest
a polymer-emulsion fluid with low proppant pack pressure and is most prone to adverse fluid-loss
damage was used. After the treatment defined the effects from exceeding a capacity limit.
formation capacity, model simulations indicated that

Subsequent treatments were improved after under- The third generation: tip-screenout
standing the formations pressure behavior as in the
Wattenberg case and for this area after understanding treatments
the implications of Appendix Eq. 3 for concentrating A proper historical perspective of this third genera-
polymer. In addition, the observation that proppant tion requires perspective from the next generations;
bridging could restrict height growth was developed however, several of its developments are reviewed
for treatments to mitigate height growth (Nolte, here. A more comprehensive presentation and refer-
1982). An effective and relatively impermeable ence are by Smith and Hannah (1996).
bridge can be formed within the pinch point to retard Demonstration of the ability to routinely place a
height growth by mixing a range of coarse and fine successful TSO treatment opened the door for effec-
sand for the first sand stage after the pad fluid. tive fracture stimulation of higher permeability
Smith et al. (1984) later sought a means to signifi- formations. Another component for the successful
cantly increase fracture width for the development of fracturing of high permeability was the continued
a chalk formation within the Valhall field in the development of synthetic proppants that can produce
Norwegian sector of the North Sea. The additional a cost-effective 10-fold increase in permeability rela-
width was required because laboratory tests indicated tive to sand for higher closure stresses (see Chapter
the likelihood of substantial proppant embedment 7). Coupling this increase in permeability with the
into the soft formation that would lead to the loss of similar increase for propped width achieved by a
effective propped width. Fracturing was considered TSO treatment in a moderate- to low-modulus for-
for this formation because other completion tech- mation provides about a 100-fold increase in con-
niques would not sustain production because of chalk ductivity over a conventional sand fracture. The
flow. The resulting treatment design was based on the conductivity increase also translates into a 100-fold
behavior on the log-log plot in Appendix Fig. 8 for increase of the target permeability for fracturing, as
the sand-disposal treatment: a purpose-designed TSO implied by Appendix Figs. 5 and 6. The increases for
treatment. For the disposal treatment, they observed width and conductivity also mitigate nondarcy (or
that after the initial screenout occurred, 2 million lbm turbulent) flow effects in the fracture for high-rate
of proppant could be placed, and the net pressure wells, particularly gas wells (see Sections 10-7.3 and
increase indicated that this occurred by doubling the 12-3.1).
width after the screenout initiated. However, the anticipated growth rate shown on
Smith et al. designed and successfully placed a Appendix Fig. 1a was slowed not only by the unan-
TSO treatment in which proppant reached the tip and ticipated, extensive contraction of activity in general,
bridged to increase the width by a factor of 2 during but also by two prevailing mind sets: high-perme-
continued slurry injection after the purpose-designed ability formations cannot be successfully fracture
TSO occurred. This design, with successful place- stimulated and why fracture a commercial well?
ment of progressively larger propped width increases, Additional field proof for the benefits of a TSO treat-
became the tool that enabled the development of this ment came from two successful programs: a signifi-
formation. The ability to significantly increase the cant improvement over conventional fracture treat-
width after screenout results from the large storage ments for the Ravenspurn gas field in the southern
capacity of a fracture, as detailed in the discussion North Sea (Martins et al., 1992b) and high-perme-
following Appendix Eqs. 4 and 5. Additional discus- ability applications in the Prudhoe Bay field (Hannah
sion on the fracture completion in Valhall field and and Walker, 1985; Reimers and Clausen, 1991;
the TSO treatment is in the Reservoir and Water Martins et al., 1992a).
Management by Indirect Fracturing section.
As a historical note, a similar concept for a TSO
was disclosed in a 1970 patent (Graham et al., Deep damage
1972), with the bridging material consisting of petro- Fracturing in Prudhoe Bay was particularly successful
leum coke particles (approximately neutral density to because deep formation damage induced by prior pro-
ensure transport to the extremities). The patents goal duction (i.e., beyond the reach of matrix treatments)
was increased width to enable placing larger size facilitated sidestepping the mind set of not applying
proppant in the fracture.

fracturing to high permeability. The incremental pro- fracture width that mechanically must continue
duction from only one year of the fracturing program around the wellbore; i.e., if the formation is pushed
would have ranked as the 10th largest producing field apart 2 in. over the large surface area of the fracture,
in the United States (e.g., Smith and Hannah, 1996), the rock around the wellbore must be displaced
without including similar results achieved by another accordingly. For a well-designed and executed frac
operator in the other half of the field. Another signifi- and pack, the initiating screenout at the tip is pro-
cant aspect of the Prudhoe Bay application is that the gressively packed back to the well to completely
fractures were routinely placed in a relatively small oil pack the resulting ring.
zone above a rising water zone without entering the The continuing success of the initial frac and
water zone (Martins et al., 1992a), which demon- packs started a rapid conversion to this completion,
strated that fracturing is a viable, potentially superior with the frac and pack becoming the preferred Gulf
alternative to matrix treatments in high-permeability of Mexico sand control completion. In addition to
formations. This precise fracturing was achieved by continued use offshore Indonesia, technology trans-
coupling an initial detailed fracture modeling study fer resulted in a wider geographical distribution for
with a calibration treatment before each proppant this sand control technique (e.g., West Africa,
treatment. Gulrajani et al., 1997b).
As for other applications of TSO treatments, on-site
redesign after a calibration treatment became a stan-
Frac and pack dard frac and pack practice. An important observation
The frac and pack completion consists of a TSO is that the same analysis procedures and design mod-
treatment before a conventional gravel pack. During els introduced for the massive treatments of tight gas
the early 1990s, frac and pack treatments were formations in the late 1970s were transferred directly
applied on a limited basis around the world, notably to frac and pack treatments in soft formations.
offshore Indonesia. Prior to the TSO treatment era,
this technique was tried at various times but without
External gravel pack
sustained success. The large propped width from a Casing connecting all perforations
TSO treatment was a necessary ingredient for suc- with propped fracture
cessful frac and pack applications, as discussed later.
The frac and pack boom was in the Gulf of
Mexico. The first successful application began
because of economic considerations and therefore Packed-back
overcame the mind set of not fracturing a commer- fracture
cial well. A significant field development was not
meeting production expectations because standard Appendix Figure 9. Successfully packed-back TSO treat-
ment.
gravel-packed completions could not consistently
achieve a low skin effect; the skin effect ranged
between 7 and 30. The skin effect was 10 after the
first frac and pack treatment and progressively
decreased to near zero from improvements in the
Reservoir and water management
treatment design and the use of larger size proppant
by indirect fracturing
(Hannah et al., 1994). Another application of TSO treatments is reservoir
The threefold-plus increase in production rate, by management. The prototype example for this applica-
eliminating the skin effect, resulted from more than tion was in the Norwegian Gullfaks field (Bale et al.,
just adding a TSO treatment to the procedure. An 1994a, 1994b). The reservoir section had a multi-
important feature of a frac and pack is reduction of darcy-permeability upper zone that graded downward
the inherent flow restriction around and through the to a permeability of about 100 md. The standard com-
perforations. The ring of proppant around the casing pletion was to perforate and gravel pack the upper
(Appendix Fig. 9) acts as an excellent external gravel zone. However, an edge-water drive would encroach
pack for reducing the pressure drop through the per- through the high-permeability zone and turn a prolific
forated region. The ring results from the large TSO oil well into an even higher water producer.

A solution was found from the pioneering work from the lower sections by fracture stimulation and
of the Valhall TSO treatment discussed for Appendix a significant increase in drawdown. This application
Fig. 8. This application in the early 1980s was for completes the link between the sand-disposal thight
more than mitigating proppant embedment. The pri- gas treatment in Appendix Fig. 8 to reservoir and
mary objective was for controlling chalk production water management with the intermediate develop-
from the primary producing zone above where the ment of the TSO-IVFC for solids control in the
TSO treatment was placed. The upper chalk zone Valhall field.
was very soft with high porosity and composed of
almost as much oil as chalk. When this zone was put
on production, chalk filled the tubing and led to cas- Screenless sand control
ing collapse. The zone was produced by placing the Another apparent role of the IVFC is to eliminate the
TSO treatment in the more competent zone below need for a screen in many sand-control environments
and extending the fracture height into the bottom of by selecting and perforating only competent sections
the very high porosity formation. This completion within or near the unconsolidated sections of the for-
enabled chalk-free production from both the upper mation. The zone selection method can potentially be
and lower zones (Smith et al., 1984). enhanced by a sonic log application. This application
This indirect access to the primary producing zone takes advantage of the generally considered negative
has come to be known as an indirect vertical fracture effect of near-wellbore refracted and relatively slower
completion (IVFC) and is illustrated in Appendix waves caused by the wellbore mechanical damage
Fig. 10. The technique of perforating and fracturing that routinely occurs in weak or highly stressed for-
only from competent sections and producing from mations (Hornby, 1993). However, for screenless
incompetent sections is a robust method for control- completions, the negative effect becomes a positive
ling the production of formation material and effect because the change in the wave speed for the
increasing recovery from the lower permeability refracted wave is a direct indication of the state of
zones by fracture stimulation. From this perspective, rock failure around the well, which is caused by the
a TSO-IVFC becomes a solids control and reservoir wellbore stress concentration within the in-situ stress
management application (see Section 5-1.2). field. Therefore, the layers with a minimal near-well
The Gullfaks adaptation by Bale et al. (1994a) change in wave speed relative to the far-field speed
also placed a TSO-IVFC in a lower competent part are the more competent candidate zones for perforat-
of the formation. In addition to providing sand con- ing and applying a TSO-IVFC to achieve screenless
trol and managing reservoir depletion, it was a water formation-material-controlled production.
management treatment because it delayed water A second method of achieving a screenless sand-
breakthrough and greatly increased reserves recovery control completion is applied without strategically
placed perforations (e.g., Malone et al., 1997). This
method couples the proppant ring around the casing
from a TSO treatment and proppant with effective
High flowback control (e.g., fibers, curable-resin-coated
permeability
proppant or both). The combination with a success-
ful packed-back TSO achieves an external gravel
Propped Low or pack of stable proppant (i.e., an external formation-
fracture moderate material screen as illustrated by Appendix Fig. 9).
permeability
Perforation and completion considerations are
addressed in Section 11-3.5.
The screenless completion obviously eliminates
the cost of the screen and related tools, but more
importantly it enables economic development of sig-
nificant behind-pipe reserves that do not warrant the
mobilization and operational costs for a rig on an
Appendix Figure 10. Indirect vertical fracture for reservoir offshore production platform, as generally required
management (Bale et al., 1994a).
for a standard gravel-pack completion.

A future generation: fracturing and of using cemented casing for effective treatment
diversion tends to be overlooked because of an appar-
reservoir engineering merger? ent failure to appreciate lifecycle economics or the
The previous discussion of the TSO generation clearly effectiveness of good cementing techniques (see
shows the blurring of what can be controlled on the Chapter 11). Staged fracturing, from correctly placed
inside and outside of the casing and of what have perforated sections, enables highly effective damage
been the traditional roles of a fracture design engineer bypass, as demonstrated by the first fracturing genera-
and a reservoir engineer. This blurring of past distinc- tions rate of 100 treatments per day in 1955.
tions provides prospects for additional innovations The general benefit for a horizontal well, particularly
and the advent of a fourth fracturing generation. with vertical variations of permeability, is magnified
by the fracture adding a large vertical permeability
component (see Chapters 11 and 12). Simply stated,
Optimal reservoir plumbing an extended reach well cannot drain what it is not con-
From a broader viewpoint, the IVFC and strategically nected to nor can it efficiently drain what it is isolated
placed perforations provide the means to extend opti- from by wellbore damage. The addition of a vertical
mized plumbing into the reservoir. Optimized plumb- fracture allows efficient drainage of all isolated sec-
ing, through a NODAL analysis, is generally practiced tions that the propped fracture reaches. The location
only for the surface facilities and within the wellbore. of the fracture, or plumbing source, can be specified by
Extended optimization requires additional considera- correctly placed perforations within a cemented casing
tions for designing the plumbing system provided by and an effective fracture design and execution. Cased
the fracture in the reservoir and also within the frac- hole logging and logging while drilling can be used
ture itself. to identify IVFC target locations for connection to by-
The outline for these considerations was defined by passed reserves and management for their exploitation.
Bale et al. (1994b) for the Gullfaks application. They
considered the role of the permeable fracture plane on
Fracturing for well testing
the reservoirs 3D flow pattern and how tailoring the
distribution of conductivity can advantageously affect The after-closure portion of Appendix Fig. 7, labeled
this flow pattern (e.g., reducing the conductivity as the transient reservoir pressure near wellbore, shows the
fracture approaches the high-permeability upper zone return of the fracturing pressure to the reservoir pres-
to delay water production while increasing the con- sure and demonstrates the well testing potential for
ductivity in the lower permeability zone and applying any injection above fracturing pressure. This potential
a large drawdown to accelerate production from this for a fracture is ensured by the well-known result that
zone; see Section 5-1.2). Therefore, the analysis and the long-term reservoir response is pseudoradial flow
design tools have evolved for considering the role of (e.g., Cinco-Ley and Samaniego-V., 1981b) and is the
fractures in NODAL analysis for reservoir, formation same flow regime used for standard well testing. An
material and water management. attractive aspect of the use of fracturing for testing is
that the fracture enhances the likelihood that all the
zones are open and captured by the test. This is an
Achieving full potential for horizontal important consideration for layered formations and
wells and laterals particularly thinly layered zones that can be missed
The preceding discussion of the IVFC is in the con- by open perforations. Another attraction of fracturing
text of single, essentially vertical wells. The potential or injection testing is that the wellbore is generally
for innovative strategies to drain a reservoir increases filled with water that provides minimal wellbore stor-
several fold by adding consideration of horizontal and age and formation volume factor effects.
lateral wells. These highly deviated wellbores are typ- The long-term radial response following fracture
ically placed without cemented casing because of eco- closure was developed and presented in a pair of
nomic considerations and therefore do not generally papers: Gu et al. (1993) from the application perspec-
reach their full potential because they lack an effective tive and Abousleiman et al. (1994) from the theoreti-
technique to remove wellbore damage. The solution cal perspective. They recognized that the radial

response from fracture injection met the assumptions tifying spurt loss is particularly important for high-
for a slug (or equivalently an impulse) test and that permeability formations and is not practically attain-
they could directly apply this developed area of reser- able by any other means than after-closure analysis.
voir technology. The after-closure analyses are presented in Section
Another well-known flow regime for a fracture is 9-6, and a method to quantify reservoir parameters
pseudolinear flow. Incorporating the analysis of this during the closure period is presented in Section 2-8.
after-closure flow regime was the last link of the frac- These applications from the reservoir behavior of
turingpressure analysis chain between the beginning fracturing complement the 1979 adoption of reservoir
of injection and returning to reservoir pressure. methodologies and achieve a direct merging of frac-
Consideration of this regime by Nolte et al. (1997) turing into the classic realm of reservoir testing and
indicated that the reservoir memory of the fractur- characterization (see Chapters 2 and 12). Reservoir
ing event can validate several aspects for analysis of characterization from a calibration testing sequence
a calibration treatment (e.g., closure time and hence to define fracturing parameters provides the ingredi-
the critical closure pressure, fracture length and hence ents essential for on-site, economics-based treatment
the fluid-loss coefficient, and the division of fluid loss optimization.
between normal wall diffusion and tip spurt). Quan-


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Reservoir Stimulation

Preface: Hydraulic Fracturing, A Technology for All Time

Chapter 1 Reservoir Stimulation in Petroleum Production

Chapter 2 Formation Characterization: Well and Reservoir Testing

5-1. Introduction treatment (see Chapters 7 and 8). However, the

Deceased more complex for cased and/or perforated wells and

Reservoir Stimulation 5-1

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

5-2 Basics of Hydraulic Fracturing

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

Reservoir Stimulation 5-3

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

are addressed separately in this section, they fre-

5-1.2. Why fracture? where the all-important production rate q is relat-

5-4 Basics of Hydraulic Fracturing

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

accelerating production from a single well to reser-

Reservoir Stimulation 5-5

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

5-6 Basics of Hydraulic Fracturing

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

5A. Design goals and variables

Vf = Vi VLp ; Vf = 2Lhf w , Vi = q i t p and VLp 6CLhLL t p + 4LhLS p , (5A-1)

p tip = (p c ) at tip K Ic apparent 1 / d , (5A-2)

revenue $(rw) minus the costs $(xf, kfw) by

Figure 5A-1. Ideal laboratory fluid-loss data for spurt

Reservoir Stimulation 5-7

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

(a) rock mechanics considerations are related to the net

In Fig. 5-7a, the fracture is initiated near the top

5-8 Basics of Hydraulic Fracturing

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

Reservoir Stimulation 5-9

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

(a) (b) (c)

5-10 Basics of Hydraulic Fracturing

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

Reservoir Stimulation 5-11

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

CfD > 30, xf limited

0.1 months. During the prior transient flow regimes,

Dimensionless fracture conductivity, CfD

Figure 5-12. Late development of pseudoradial flow.

5-12 Basics of Hydraulic Fracturing

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

Reservoir Stimulation 5-13

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

5-14 Basics of Hydraulic Fracturing

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

5200 Assuming a simple case of a long, constant-height

Figure 5-14. Relationship of pnet to stress differences.

Consider a slit in an infinite elastic media (i.e., the

Reservoir Stimulation 5-15

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

w i . (5-18) where ptip is the pressure required at the fracture tip

5-16 Basics of Hydraulic Fracturing

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

Reservoir Stimulation 5-17

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.

Invaded Reservoir Closure

Chapter 6, the parameter for this calculation is gov-

5-18 Basics of Hydraulic Fracturing

2010 COPYRIGHT MERCADO NEGRO, LAS PLAYITAS. MARACAIBO-EDO. ZULIA, VENEZUELA.