Overview: Cotton Valley Hydraulic Fracture Imaging Project

Zinno, Richar J. and Gibson, John B. and Walker, Ray N. and Withers, Robert J. (1998) Overview: Cotton Valley Hydraulic Fracture Imaging Project. In: SEG Technical Program Expanded Abstracts 1998. SEG Technical Program Expanded Abstracts . Society of Exploration Geophysicists, pp. 926-929. ISBN 1052-3812

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Official URL: https://library.seg.org/doi/abs/10.1190/1.1820642

Abstract

This paper describes an experiment to image hydraulicfractures in the Cotton Valley sands at approximately9,500’ depth. The purpose is to determine key geometricalattributes of those hydraulic fractures. A pilot study usingone monitor well with a single geophone at normal wellspacing and preliminary results from a more detailed studyinvolving two monitor wells with arrays of geophones arepresented.In the pilot study, it is shown that microseismic eventsinduced by hydraulic fracturing at a depth of 9,500’ weredetected at distances exceeding 1,300’ from the origin.Analysis of results indicated that a more complex geophonearray was necessary. An industry consortium of majoroperators, service companies, government agencies andnational laboratories was formed to perform a moredetailed study using 96 3-component geophone sondesdistributed among two monitor wells. These monitor wellsoffset the treatment well using nominal 80 acre spacingrules and will be used as producers. A unique microseismicrecording system specifically designed and manufacturedfor these operating depths (~9,500’) is presented. Imagingis accomplished by using various data analysis techniquesincluding real-time event location.Applications of the technology include optimization ofhydraulic fracture designs and accurate mapping of fracturegeometry. Fracture models will be developed to accuratelydepict fracture growth as determined by this project.

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Item Type: Book Section
Subjects: Methodology > Other-additional study
Region > USA > Texas > Cotton Valley
Inducing technology > Unconventional hydrocarbon extraction
Project: SERA > COTTON VALLEY: uconventional hydrocarbon extraction