SPE-177173-MS

Case Study: Hydraulic Fracture Treatment with Proppant During Drillstem

Tests with Same Temporary Completion String
Diogo Engel, Vinicios Azevedo, and Fernando Marcancola, Halliburton

Copyright 2015, Society of Petroleum Engineers

This paper was prepared for presentation at the SPE Latin American and Caribbean Petroleum Engineering Conference held in Quito, Ecuador, 18 –20 November
2015.

This paper was selected for presentation by an SPE program committee following review of information contained in an abstract submitted by the author(s). Contents
of the paper have not been reviewed by the Society of Petroleum Engineers and are subject to correction by the author(s). The material does not necessarily reflect
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consent of the Society of Petroleum Engineers is prohibited. Permission to reproduce in print is restricted to an abstract of not more than 300 words; illustrations may
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Abstract
Historically, a fracture treatment with proppant is performed with a dedicated workstring connected to
downhole completion equipment (such as a permanent packer, a tubing seal receptacle (TSR), or a locator
assembly). This paper discusses offshore field operations in Brazil to illustrate how surface and downhole
equipment, including a temporary completion string, were capable of meeting these challenges for
hydraulic fracturing using ceramic proppants, followed by an acid job before a drillstem test (DST), which
saved at least 6 days of rig time.
When performing a DST with a temporary completion string, there are risks associated with using this
type of fracturing treatment these mechanical tools can lock up if they are operated with proppant still
packed in the operating sections (such as the tester valve and circulation valve). It is recommended that
during the job the tool operation should be minimized to the absolute minimum because proppant can be
packed in other areas of the tools. Halliburton performed extensive testing before the operation to
determine the erosional limits of the DST tools; as a result of this testing, the maximum flow rate of the
fracturing process was limited to 23 bbl/min. In this treatment, debris-tolerant valves, rather than standard
valves were used. The debris-tolerant valves were specifically designed and tested to manage more debris.
The well-test surface equipment was made of a solid-tolerant design, including a choke manifold (high
abrasion tolerance), a four-phase separator, which was used to separate the solids, and surge tanks that are
suitable for managing well flow that contains solids. Additional atmospheric tanks were provided in the
test plant as part of a contingency plan to store fluids in the event of a high concentration of solids or/and
untreatable fluid, which cannot be discarded or burned; sensors for solids were installed downstream from
the choke manifold.
During the hydraulic fracturing operation, 2,760 bbl of fracturing fluid containing the 20/40 mesh size
proppant was pumped at a rate of 23 bbl/min with a maximum concentration of 6 lbm/gal. During the
fracturing job, a screenout occurred, and the contingency plan was followed, removing most of the
proppant inside the string. The well-testing plant received 130 bbl of the fracturing fluid at the surface
during the cleanup of the well. The DST tools were fully functionable after the fracture treatment, and the
test was successfully performed.
The main objectives of well testing included the characterization of the reservoir (primarily, all
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variables to calculate the productivity index and the reservoir fluid (specific gravity (SG) of oil and gas/oil
ratio (GOR). A stimulation technique is commonly used to increase the PI, and in some cases, with
exploratory wells, the stimulation and well testing are combined to gather information to determine the
effectiveness of the technique and whether or not this method is sufficient to make the block lucrative.
One of these stimulation techniques is hydraulic fracturing, which is a process that pumps fluids down a
well at specific rates and at pressures sufficient to create fractures in the formation. A support agent, in
this case the proppant, is needed to keep the fractures open; proppant is usually made from a ceramic-type
of material. The proppant is transported by the fluid to fill the resulting fractures. Another characteristic
required by the supporting agent is a well-controlled geometry and size that will not hamper the flow of
the hydrocarbons.

Introduction
The operator needed to gather information about the reservoir, and wireline logs had shown a need to
stimulate the well for it to be economically feasible. The recommended technique was to perform a
hydraulic fracture job with supporting agents; however, there was a problem. It was crucial to have the
DST information as quickly as possible. The order and delivery time required to obtain downhole
completion equipment was more than a year.
Consequently, performing a fracture job without a permanent packer would imply in combating losses
after the fracture job which would defeat the purpose of performing a fracture job in the first place. The
only possible solution was to perform the fracture job with the DST string, which is classed as a temporary
completion string.
At the end of the job, after unsetting the packer, it will still be necessary to combat any losses, undoing
any stimulation job and possibly hampering future stimulations on this well. Considering that this is an
exploratory well and that exploratory wells are not commonly used for production, it is possible that
through using the DST string to save on the use of both completion equipment and rig time by not having
to perform the downhole completions in running a dedicated workstring in the hole. The use of the same
DST string to perform the fracture job resulted in a savings of at least 6 days of rig time.
The DST was performed to evaluate and to verify the economic value of the exploratory reservoir.
Dynamic underbalance perforating with TCP guns was used to perforate the interval with release of the
guns to the bottom of the well. The hydraulic fracturing job was then performed. The well test program
consisted of three flow periods which included cleaning, measuring, bottomhole sampling, and production
logging with two build-up periods. The test interval was abandoned with a cement plug on top of a
permanent bridge plug (PBP).
Before the fracturing job, several tests were performed, these included an injectivity test, step rate test,
step down test, and mini fracture, to establish the optimal flow rate and the volumes and concentrations
of proppant for each stage of the fracturing job. A real-time link was run in the hole to collect data from
the downhole gauges that were specifically added to the string to gather the information needed to further
optimize the fracturing job design.
Then, hydraulic fracturing was performed, using ceramic proppants, followed by a bullheading acid
stage. During the fracturing job, the pressure began to increase, indicating that a screenout was occurring;
when it reached the limit of the surface well testing head, the operation was aborted. The contingency plan
was implemented, cycling the annulus pressure to open the circulating ports of the downhole valve.
Within 15 minutes of aborting the fracturing job, the process began to reverse circulate to clean up the
string. During the reverse circulation, 577 bbl (approximately twice the volume of the test string) was
pumped with a flow rate of 8 bbl/min; the entire volume was received at the well-testing plant because
of the presence of oil and solids. The acid was then spotted approximately 100 m above the reverse
circulation valve, the valve was closed, and the treatment was injected to the formation.
SPE-177173-MS 3

Contingency Plan
The possibility of a screenout during fracturing was thoroughly discussed, and the decision was made to
reverse circulate as soon as possible after the screenout occurred. Speed was determined to be a key factor
in avoiding further problems that would lead to issues with the DST downhole and Sub-Sea tools to
prevent the breakdown of the gel and proppant decantation.
Downhole Tools, Gauge Data Acquisition, and Samplers
The fracturing proppant can settle underneath the moving parts of the testing tools and limit their
operation; the tools can also lock up if they are used while proppant is packed in the operating sections.
A debris-tolerant circulation valve was used, rather than the standard valve, because it was specifically
designed and tested to manage more debris.
Several tests were developed to determine the maximum acceptable rates when pumping fluids through
the DST tools. For large jobs, the maximum pumping rate of proppant is limited to 24 bbl/min. Velocities
are based on testing with sand concentrations of 8.0 lb/gal with a total of 250,000 lb of sand pumped.
Increased sand concentrations will have minimal erosional increases because the contact area is limited
to the outer rim of the flow stream, and erosion is primarily based on velocity and the type of fluid being
pumped. Because of the fluid direction change in the circulating valve ports, half of these rates would be
reasonable.
Proppant can also restrict the round mandrel slip joint performance. To help prevent this interference,
the slip joints should be inverted to reduce the risk of proppant getting into the volume balancing areas
also to vent from the bottom, flushing out any excess proppant.
Subsea Safety System Tree for Fracture Jobs
In the past, several steps were required to perform a fracture job during the DST. In these steps, the
landing string (water depth string) would be pulled out of the hole, then run in again without the subsea
safety system to fracture the formation. It would then be pulled out of the hole again to enable the subsea
safety system tree (SSST) to be reinstalled on the landing string. The time required to make this additional
trip could easily exceed 24 hours in an ultra-deepwater scenario. This additional time could result in
increased costs per trip of more than USD 1 million. The newly developed SSST also reduces the steps
traditionally performed during a fracture job pumping procedure because it can eliminate two trips (48
hours), which equates to a savings of more than USD 2 million per job (Rubio et al. 2013).
For a DST, the subsea safety system makes it possible to disconnect the landing string and safely close
the well, which enables the rig to be moved and the riser to be disconnected in the event of an emergency
or bad weather conditions.
After an accreditation process for the SSST, a test process was developed to replicate the job
conditions. To verify the functionality, the following conditions were replicated:
● 13,000 psi fracture pressure with a pumping rate of 23 bbl/min
● 6 lbm/gal of sand/proppant in the fracture fluid
A list of tests was developed using the following gel compositions for each batch:
● 2,000 gal mix water
● 2,000 gal flush water
● 100 lbm WG – 24 gel
● 3 lbm citric acid
● 3 gas MO – 67
To simulate a fracture job scenario, a layout was prepared to supply 13,000 psi in a 23 bbl/min flow,
with 6 lbm/gal of 20-40 sand added to the system.
4 SPE-177173-MS

After installing the new SSST, the sand would be added until a flow concentration of 6 lbm/gal was
reached. Using choke manifolds, the flow would be restricted to an initial flow of 12 bbl/min through the
circuit. Sand would be added gradually until a flow concentration of 6 lbm/gal was reached. In this
controlled process, the flow would be restricted to increase the pressure to 13,000 psi, which would be
continued until leaking was observed or until the temperature reached 150°F; at this temperature, the fluid
would lose the capacity to lift the sand. Several flow cycles were needed to pump the total volume of sand
through the SSST.
Currently, the SSST designed for fracturing is capable of working in a severe environment with a
13,000-psi fracture pressure, 23 bbl/min pumping rate, and 6 lbm/gal of sand/proppant in the fracture
fluid. The SSST can cut 1-1/2 in. coiled tubing and has two injection ports. In this case, the injection ports
were used to inject monoethylene glycol (MEG) (to prevent hydrates) and a paraffin inhibitor (AB-9). The
paraffin inhibitor was pumped at the end of flowing period and at the beginning of static period; the MEG
was pumped during the cleaning period and stopped when the basic sediment water (BSW) was low.
Case Study
During this project, with just over half of the total volume scheduled for pumping during fracturing, a
screen out occurred (excessive packing and obstruction of the passage channel by the proppant). The
circulation valve was cycled with applied annulus pressure to quickly enable the reverse circulation,
preventing gel breakdown and decantation of the fracturing proppant. This step was the most critical
because the column fluid was heavier than the annulus, which could damage the circulation valve seals.
The excellent performance of the valve prevented the column from becoming stuck as a result of the
proppant, and it was not necessary to use coiled tubing to clean the column before pulling out of hole.
Fig. 1 shows a gauge carrier at the end of the operation; a great deal of proppant mixed with oil is
present in the tool slots. Proppant was also observed at the circulation valve ports, at the sampler carrier
slots, and at the packer assembly.

Figure 1—Gauge carrier with proppant.

A critical step in gathering the information needed for a reservoir evaluation is the capture and analysis
of a representative sample. In this project, the samplers worked perfectly, despite the large volume of
proppant that was injected into the formation. The rupture disks of the sampler carrier were full of
proppant, as shown in Fig. 2. In this project, the conventional activation with rupture disks was used, and
the tools were operated with applied annulus pressure.
SPE-177173-MS 5

Figure 2—Rupture disk of the sampler carrier.

Fig. 3 shows the nitrogen chamber pressure data in the sampler carrier. The initial nitrogen charge
pressure at the surface was 11,500 psi. While running the tool into the hole, this pressure increased as a
result of the temperature increase; the pressure exceeded 14,200 psi at the sampling depth. By the time
the sample collection was completed, the pressure decreased to approximately 12,870 psi. This decrease
occurred because there was a balance between the bottomhole pressure and the nitrogen chamber pressure.

Figure 3—Sampler carrier nitrogen chamber pressure chart.

6 SPE-177173-MS

As shown in the bottom half of Fig. 3, the pressure of the collected samples could be monitored while
pulling out of hole until the opening pressure could be observed (10,510 psi) at the surface. In this way,
a quality-control check was provided to verify that the samples remained in single phase during the DST.

Surface Well Testing Equipment

The layout of the surface equipment included a water treatment unit because of the high return of aqueous
fluid in the well as a result of stimulation. The well-testing plant included a heater to assist in the
separation and emulsion-breaking processes (primarily attributable to fracture). To optimize the process
of cleaning after fracturing, a multiphase meter (MPM) was installed because a great deal of water
production was expected. A solids detector was installed upstream of the choke manifold to monitor the
return of proppant in the well-testing plant.
At the reverse circulation after the fracture treatment, the well-testing plant received 130 bbl of
proppant. The fracturing fluid passed through the choke manifold (high abrasion tolerance), and four-
phase test separator, and was later directed to the atmospheric tanks. A large amount of proppant had to
be pumped through the transfer pumps, as shown in Fig. 4.

Figure 4 —Proppant at the transfer pumps in the well testing plant.

To clean the well-test tanks, it was necessary to open the manhole and use a shovel to transfer the
proppant to drums. It was not possible to suction the proppant from the tanks with the cuttings dryer
vacuum. Fig. 5 shows that the amount of proppant is visible inside of an atmospheric tank.
SPE-177173-MS 7

Figure 5—Atmospheric tank with proppant.

Conclusion
Technology adds more flexibility and reliability to well testing operations and improves the efficiency of
downhole-testing by reducing nonproductive time (NPT), and subsequently, the cost of well intervention.
An excellent working relationship with the oil operators also proved to be very important to the
development and success of the new technology because the operators were instrumental in proving that
the new concept could provide the needed solution to enhance cost reduction.
Regarding deepwater-rig day rates (estimated to be approximately USD 500,000) and the time needed
to re-run a test string, the use of more reliable tools means significant savings for a project. This saving
may be even greater because rig day rates could reach higher levels.
Although the improved technology has resolved some of the major challenges in deepwater testing, the
same precautions related to well conditioning should continue to be performed. These precautionary
measures include running bits and scrapers with a riser brush, circulating at least two bottoms-up when
using heavy-weight mud, using riser booster pumps to improve debris carrying (as a result of loss of flow
speed in the riser), and performing flex-run testing that consists of internal-tubing-pressure cycles using
ballooning effects to remove scales from the internal walls of the pipe. It is also a best practice to perform
chemical treatments (eg: acidizing) after flex-run operations. This treatment is recommended because
various types of trash (such as plastic, subsea umbilical ropes, and brass pins) are sometimes found in
downhole tools, and the valve was not designed to operate in these conditions.
Since the initiation of the use of debris-tolerant technology in testing, the efficiency of well testing
operations in deepwater wells has increased significantly. Consequently, most oil companies operating in
Brazil include this technology in the testing strings for their well-testing projects.

Acknowledgements
The authors wish to thank the management of Halliburton for their help and permission to write this paper.
8 SPE-177173-MS

References
Engel, D., Azevedo, V. and Pontes, T. 2014. Improvements to Data Acquisition and Bottomhole Fluid
Sampling in Offshore Drill-Stem Testing. Presented at the Latin American and Caribbean
Petroleum Engineering Conference, Maracaibo, Venezuela, 21–23 May. Paper SPE-169477-MS.
http://dx.doi.org/10.2118/169477-MS.
Marcancola, F., Nolasco, H., Rubio, L., and Barcelos, R. 2013. New Subsea Safety Tree for Extreme
Environments Successfully Meets Challenges in Brazil for Drill-Stem Testing/Fracturing Jobs.
Presented at the OTC Brasil, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 29-31 October. http://dx.doi.org/10.4043/
24440-MS.