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OIL & GAS

Steve Jewell exconines the controversial iracking process and industry's effort to mitigate its risks

HERE were two earthquakes recorded near Blackpool, UK during April this year. Both of them were unusually shallow and very close to the site of an ongoing drilling operation for gas. The media blamed a new drilling technique called fracking for these unusual 'man-made' earthquakes and operations have now been halted. In the US, residents blame fracking for contaminating local water supplies - there are videos of people setting fire to the water coming from their taps. In France, the backlash against proposed projects led parliament to ban the technique altogether. It's fair to say the public has a negative perception of fracking but what are the real risks and how is the industry minimising them?

old process, new scale

Eirst of all, fracking is not new. The process has been used since 1947 when the first attempts were made to improve or 'stimulate' oil and gas production from poorly performing wells. The idea was

to crack or fracture the rocks containing hydrocarbons to increase the surface area and the fiow of oil and gas, or to increase breakthrough damage at the interface with the wellbore. Explosives were tried but had limited success as they tended to rubblise the reservoir rock resulting in wellbore collapse and mechanical problems in the borehole. Fracturing the rock by applying huge pressures was far easier and had more predictable results. Furthermore, drillers had a variety of fiuids at their disposal, including water, gels, foams, or compressed gases, including nitrogen, CO^ and air. And so fracture stimulation was born. Fracturing, 'fraccing' or 'fracking' the rock quickly became common practice in low permeability reservoirs where oil or gas production might otherwise be uneconomic. Drillers deployed large high pressure pumping units capahle of delivering huge volumes of water at sustained high pressures and at a very fast rate.

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4 4 fracture stimulation consumes water and chemicals and generates potential waste, but the technology to deal with this and re-use the fluids is well established and available

Large areas of the rock must be exposed to achieve commercial fiowrates and the current approach is to drill long horizontal wells through the shale for distances of between 1 and 2 km. This exposes a lot of rock but it is still not enough. The horizontal borehole is then fracked a number of times in discreet stages. Typically ten or more massive propped fractures can be achieved in a long horizontal well - this creates a much more significant surface area to permit sufficient gas to fiow.

concerns run deep

There are two environmental issues facing the industry when it comes to fracking, particularly in popuiated areas. The first is related to the careful management of water. A ten stage fracture operation may require in excess of 500,000 gallons (1.9m 1) of water with instantaneous injection rates exceeding 10 m'per minute. When the fiuid has been pumped and the rock has been fractured the well is flowed back to surface. Less fiuid returns and its chemical composition can change as it reacts with the rock. Processing the water and then either disposing of it or re-using it is technically straightforward thanks to membrane and distillation methods, but the volumes involved demand very careful planning and logistical management. The challenges are different between populated areas and remote regions. Sourcing the water in desert areas can obviously be problematic. In more populated areas it may be easier to source water but the number of truck movements can become objectionable.

Main picture (left): Engineers install tracking equipment, while an elevated view (top rigt)t) shows a typical frac pump spread. Note the high pressure pipework between the two lines of pumps, mounted on trucks.

The first step is to split the rock. By understanding the overburden, the pore pressure in the reservoir, and the mechanical properties of the target formation, drillers calculate the necessary fracture pressure. Once the rock is cracked open, it needs to be held open. Otherwise, once the pumping stops, the fracture will close or heal and the gas will cease tofiow.To keep it open, engineers add a proppant material such as coarse sand to the pumping fiuid, which fills the fracture and maintains the new fiow path once the pumping stops. Proppants and chemical additives are selected to maintain the rheology of the pumping fluid and also to make sure the proppant is delivered to the fracture, deep underground, without dropping out of solution and simply falling to the bottom of the well. Pumping the fluid dovm requires a significant amount of hardware. As well as the high pressure pumping equipment (see main picture), typical sites contain hundreds of metres of pipework and dozens of silos, and tanks. Over the years, fracture stimulation as a technique has developed significantly. Deeper and more challenging reservoirs have been targeted and the amount of equipment needed as well as the pump volumes has increased dramatically. Today the bigger fracture treatments are deployed on gas accumulations in shale. As shale has a relatively high concentration of organic content, it can contain considerable volumes of gas but due to its tight layers of sediment the fiow of gas is extremely limited.

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4 4 education and demonstration is needed to win over the public who will naturally tear what they carmot readily seem%

Tbe second big issue and the one dominating the US at present is contamination of the water table. To date, it is poor cementing jobs that have led to fracking fluids leaking from the well itself into local water supplies. These isolated incidents could have been avoided with more robust cementing practices. Away from tbe drilled weU, tbere is anotber as yet unsubstantiated fear tbat large fractures can propagate upwards from tbe sbale itself into shallower formations thereby allowing fracturing fluids to migrate into the local water supply, or for methane gas to leak into the system and be produced at tbe domestic tap. Tbese are emotive issues and are being used to put significant pressure on government agencies to stop fracking altogetber or at least introduce a moratorium pending further investigations.

indicate wbere the fracture has gone and its approximate size. Sensitive geophones are places around the area of the weflbore on tbe ground surface. As tbe rock fractures, tiny seismic events are recorded, belping to build a 3D picture of what is happening deep underground (see
Figure 1).

iracking challenge
As it happens, the mecbanical properties of rocks and tbeir bebaviour under stress can be reasonably predicted. Tbere are also well established metbods for tbe design of fracture stimulation treatments. Tbe size and direction of tbe fracture is determined in advance from data gatbered during the driUing operation. In addition, 'microseismic' monitoring arrays are used to

A variety of chemicals are used in tbe fracturing fluid, cbiefly to control tbe fluid's physical properties or rheology. The fluid needs to bebave predictably over a range of pressures, temperatures and timescales. A varierty of proprietary gels, surfactants, emulsion controllers and viscosifiers are used and tbe precise recipe of tbis cocktail can be commercially sensitive. Tbis is a problem for industry as it suggests tbe fracking companies bave sometbing to bide. Tbere needs to be a greater openess about tbe type and volume of chemicals used. They are not fundamentally harmful but the industry needs to demonstrate this openly to win over the general public. The biggest cballenge facing tbe industry is one of managing public perception. Yes, fracture stimulation consumes water and cbemicals and generates potential waste, but tbe tecbnology to deal witb tbis and re-use the fluids is well established and available. Tbe risk of fracture propagation into tbe water table can also be managed beforeband through good geomechanical analysis and thereafter by monitoring precisely tbe ensuing fracture activity. A process of education and demonstration is needed to win over tbe public wbo will naturally fear what they cannot readily see. This is something only the industry can achieve effectively; its arguments need to be based on sound science, engineering and common sense to avoid tbe pitfalls of it becoming a political football. As for tbe recent 'eartbquakes' in Blackpool - it comes as no surprise tbat tbese were detected by tbe extremely sensitive geopbones of tbe Britisb Geological Survey - tbe real question is whether they picked up a man-made tremor or simply tbe fracture propagation itself? t e e

Figure 1: IVIicroseismic dafa can give a strong qualitative indication of where the frac has gone and whether shallow water source formations could have been affected

Steve Jewell {steve.jevi/eil@xodusgroup. com) is director of wells and subsurface at the energy consultancy Xodus Group

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