Proppant-Induced Opening of Hydraulically Created Fractures
Selvadurai, A.P.S.1
1 William Scott Professor and Distinguished James McGill Professor Department of Civil Engineering and Applied Mechanics McGill University Montréal, QC, Canada H3A 0C3
Open Geomechanics, Volume 1 (2019), article no. 2, 10 p.

The paper examines the problem of the open configuration created when a hydraulic fracture fluid containing a granular proppant is introduced into the fracture. The mathematical modelling examines the problem of an extended cracked region that is wedged open by a granular material present over a finite region of the crack. The combination of the geostatic stress state and the contact stress created between the granular proppant and the elastic rock mass is used to develop a consistency relationship for estimating the dimension of the region of the fracture that will remain open when the pressures applied to create the fracture are released. The interactive mechanics of the fracture and the proppant has an influence on the geometry of the open region that provides the pathway for extraction of the resource.

Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published online:
DOI: 10.5802/ogeo.1
Keywords: Hydraulic fracture, proppant-fracture interaction, Griffith fracture models, zones of separation
Selvadurai, A.P.S. 1

1 William Scott Professor and Distinguished James McGill Professor Department of Civil Engineering and Applied Mechanics McGill University Montréal, QC, Canada H3A 0C3
License: CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0
Copyrights: The authors retain unrestricted copyrights and publishing rights 
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Selvadurai, A.P.S. Proppant-Induced Opening of Hydraulically Created Fractures. Open Geomechanics, Volume 1 (2019), article  no. 2, 10 p. doi : 10.5802/ogeo.1. https://opengeomechanics.centre-mersenne.org/articles/10.5802/ogeo.1/

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