Frac Communication

FRAC Monitoring Horizontal Wellbores

As operators drill and develop acreage with horizontal wellbores, it has become apparent that in extremely low permeability areas very small spacing will be required to fully develop the field.  Because of the spacing, wellbores will be in close proximity to each other.  It is also necessary to perform hydraulic fracture stimulation (5-20 stages per well) to make them economic.   Because of these factors, nearby producing adjacent stimulation jobs can affect other wells.

Operators wish to understand not only the severity of the communication / interference with nearby wellbores but also want to have a digital record should ANOTHER operator be the responsible party for knocking their producing well off line. Operators normally opt to shut-in these offset or nearby wells when they know frac operations will take place.  This is an ideal opportunity to capture a Pressure Build-up as a secondary benefit to monitoring the offset well with a SPIDR gauge.  Because the biggest hurdle to Pressure Transient Analysis is the reluctance to shut-in a producing well, when this occurs for other reasons, it’s a potential secondary benefit to the monitoring operation.