Key technologies for increasing production based on the best practices of major shale oil and gas basins

Abstract

Key technologies that make productivity increase are revealed through analyzing the best practices and production data in major shale basins of North America. Trends of the key technologies and optimization designs for shale oil and gas development are summarized and analyzed based on drilling and completion operations and well data. These technologies mainly include: (1) Optimizing well design and hydraulic fracturing design, including reducing cluster spacing, increasing proppant and fracturing fluid volumes, optimizing horizontal well lateral length and fracture stage length. The most effective method is to reduce cluster spacing to an optimized length. The second most effective method is to optimally increase proppant volumes. (2) Placing horizontal wells in the sweet spots and drilling the wells parallel or close to the minimum horizontal stress direction. (3) Using cube development with optimized well spacing to maximize resource recovery and reduce well interferences. Plus, in-situ stress impacts on hydraulic fracture propagation and hydrocarbon production are addressed. Determination of formation breakdown pressure is studied by considering the impacts of in-situ stresses, drilling and perforation directions. Whether or not the hydraulic fracturing can generate orthogonal fracture networks is also discussed. The key technologies and optimization design parameters proposed in this paper can be applied to guide new well placement, drilling and completion designs, and hydraulic fracture operations to increase productivity.