Why Fracking Works

Although spectacular advances in hydraulic fracturing, also known as fracking, have taken place and many aspects are well understood by now, the topology, geometry, and evolution of the crack system remain an enigma and mechanicians wonder: Why fracking works? Fracture mechanics of individual fluid-pressurized cracks has been clarified but the vital problem of stability of interacting hydraulic cracks escaped attention. First, based on the known shale permeability, on the known percentage of gas extraction from shale stratum, and on two key features of the measured gas outflow which are (1) the time to peak flux and (2) the halftime of flux decay, it is shown that the crack spacing must be only about 0.1 m. Attainment of such a small crack spacing requires preventing localization in parallel crack systems. Therefore, attention is subsequently focused on the classical solutions of the critical states of localization instability in a system of cooling or shrinkage cracks. Formulated is a hydrothermal analogy which makes it possible to transfer these solutions to a system of hydraulic cracks. It is concluded that if the hydraulic pressure profile along the cracks can be made almost uniform, with a steep enough pressure drop at the front, the localization instability can be avoided. To achieve this kind of profile, which is essential for obtaining crack systems dense enough to allow gas escape from a significant portion of kerogen-filled nanopores, the pumping rate (corrected for the leak rate) must not be too high and must not be increased too fast. Furthermore, numerical solutions are presented to show that an idealized system of circular equidistant vertical cracks propagating from a horizontal borehole behaves similarly. It is pointed out that one useful role of the proppants, as well as the acids that promote creation of debris in the new cracks, is to partially help to limit crack closings and thus localization. To attain the crack spacing of only 0.1 m, one must imagine formation of hierarchical progressively refined crack systems. Compared to new cracks, the system of pre-existing uncemented natural cracks or joints is shown to be slightly more prone to localization and thus of little help in producing the fine crack spacing required. So, from fracture mechanics viewpoint, what makes fracking work?–the mitigation of fracture localization instabilities. This can also improve efficiency by fracturing more shale. Besides, it is environmentally beneficial, by reducing flowback per m3 of gas. So is the reduction of seismicity caused by dynamic fracture instabilities (which are more severe in underground CO2 sequestration).

Softening Instability: Part II—Localization Into Ellipsoidal Regions

Extending the preceding study of exact solutions for finite-size strain-softening regions in layers and infinite space, exact solution of localization instability is obtained for the localization of strain into an ellipsoidal region in an infinite solid. The solution exploits Eshelby’s theorem for eigenstrains in elliptical inclusions in an infinite elastic solid. The special cases of localization of strain into a spherical region in three dimensions and into a circular region in two dimensions are further solved for finite solids — spheres in 3D and circles in 2D. The solutions show that even if the body is infinite the localization into finite regions of such shapes cannot take place at the start of strain-softening (a state corresponding to the peak of the stress-strain diagram) but at a finite strain-softening slope. If the size of the body relative to the size of the softening region is decreased and the boundary is restrained, homogeneous strain-softening remains stable into a larger strain. The results also can be used as checks for finite element programs for strain-softening. The present solutions determine only stability of equilibration states but not bifurcations of the equilibrium path.