Currently there are mainly three types of proppant categories in the market: quartz sand, resin coated sand and ceramic proppant.
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Properties of different proppants:
Quartz sand is the earliest application of fracturing proppant, though with lower cost, yet the strength is also relatively low (5000-10000psi), only for shallow wells, which is easily broken in the process of transport and handling. Also the quality of the sand differs a lot because of the diverse mine resources.
Resin coated sand is coated on the basis of the original sand to enhance the compressive strength, but the fracking gap is easily plugged by adhesive resin at a certain temperature and pressure, thus reducing the conductivity. In addition, the fracturing equipment is easily wore out because of even shape, thus its service life is greatly reduced.
The ceramic proppant is made by high temperature sintering technology with uniform shape, high compression strength (10000-20000psi) and strong flow conductivity, which can significantly improve the oil well production and recovery.
From HSE point, the silica element of quartz sand has a negative impact on the environment. The pollution during resin coated sand production process and fracturing process also cannot be underestimated. In contrast, as the main raw material of ceramic proppant, bauxite is high temperature-sintered, with stable performance, which can be described as from nature to nature.
Without considering the economic costs, how to choose the right proppant among different types if you are the customer? Of course, to decide the proppant type according to its oil and gas output, compared with long term conductivity of each type. The main factors affecting proppant conductivity are particle size, sieving distribution, strength (crushing rate), and shape (sphericity, surface smoothness), etc.
As a professional ceramic proppant supplier, Wanli focus on the R & D, production and sales of ceramic proppant with over twenty years. Wanli continues to step foreward in scientific research, developing the difference among the various proppant. From below indicators case, let’s compare the difference between diverse proppant.
Ceramic proppant has a better sphericity with smoother surface, which can reduce the wear of fracturing equipment when pumping. But the shape and sphericity of quartz sand changes a lot with the increase of pressure, the wear of fracturing equipment is four times higher than that of ceramic proppant, which will ultimately affect the long-term conductivity and reduce the oil and gas production.
2.Strength (crushing rate)
From figure 2 we can see that both the quartz sand and coated sand has a poor stability, because the crushing rate has increased rapidly with the increase of pressure, which are prone to collapse.
3.Sieving Distribution
During the process of ceramic proppant sintering, the sieve distribution can be controlled strictly, and the particle size distribution is more concentrated, which can increase the conductivity.
From the conductivity data of three different kinds of proppant of the same size, as shown in Figure 4, we can see that the conductivity of the ceramic proppant is far better than the quartz sand and coated sand. In addition, the production of the oil well is much better than that of quartz sand by using ceramic proppant. Therefore, ceramic proppant is the most ideal fracturing proppant with the lowest cost from the long-term cost and benefits.(see Figure 5 and Figure 6). But under the current market conditions, the operators have to choose the lowest price of quartz sand as a support agent in order to save cost. Yet, we believe that the operators will make the most rational choice when the market warms up or the price and performance of the proppant having a new breakthrough.
Case Study: Natural Sand VS Wanli Ceramic Proppant
Bakken Case Study
Decline per Frac Stage Sand vs. Wanli Ceramic Proppant
Price, price, still price
Since the second half of year of 2014 the oil price began falling fiercely, from 120$/barrel to 28$/barrel, now the motivation of exploring oil&gas is their price, at fracturing process, when the operators choose proppants and other equipment, products, firstly comes to their mind is cost, cost, still cost. How to survive on the current depressing oil price condition, is a problem the entire industry is concerning.
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As a manufacturer of ceramic proppant, of course we know now many fracturing activities are choosing silica sand which costs less instead of ceramics or resin coated sand, the ceramic proppant industry is facing the crisis they have never met before, but crisis also means opportunity, how to survive, breakthrough and change in crisis is a pressing matter of the moment of ceramic manufacturing enterprises.
Wanli substitution type ceramic: (can be substitution of silica sand)
Wanli started from the purpose of meeting demand of current clients, strengthened the work of scientific research, using new materials, and after hundreds of thousands of dosing improvements and technology changes, successfully developed a kind of ceramic proppant which functions closely to normal ceramic proppant and much superior than silica sand, while can compete on silica sand for price. We believe this product can help us gaining more customers. Who wouldn’t like to spend the almost same price of silica sand to purchase ceramics which function much better? Survival of the fittest in natural selection. Those who can survive in such a harsh market conditions and innovate themselves will have the qualification to laugh in the end.
Except for saving cost for the customer, after lots of communication with different kinds of clients, Wanli is also pretty clear about the development trend of ceramic proppant------Super high strength ceramics and Functional ceramics.
Super high strength ceramics:
For the future fracturing process in deep ocean, super high strength ceramics will be used, the old ceramic proppant which can stands pressure of 15000psi might be not able to meet the requirement any more. According to this developing trend, Wanli improved the dosing of ceramics, controlled the strength of products by adopting materials with bauxites cantain higher ratio of AlOand Kaoli and adjusting the sintering temperature and sintering time. Of course the improvement of raw materials and technologies surely would make the price higher than conventional ceramics.
Functional ceramics asfollows.
Self suspended ceramic proppant:
Using special polymer to coat the normal ceramics(process environmental and material can be degraded). After the water absorption its own portion weight lower down, changed the composition of water, making it owns a certain suspension performance in the sand carrying fluid. The suspended ceramic grains exist in a uniform way among clear water, therefore they have better mobility in the formation fracturing process, which won’t lead to partial accumulation and sand blocking phenomenon. Meanwhile, the operation process of self suspended ceramic is sample enough to shorter the fracturing cost and time. Currently Wanli had achieved a significant effect on the research and development of self suspended ceramic, after some modification they can be commercial produced immediately.
Adsorption ceramics:
For the adsorption ceramics Wanli had developed, the internal pores occupy 20%-25% of the total volume, with a lower bulk density, the adsorption amount (absorption of chemicals) can reach up to about 15%, the closure pressure within 7500psi can be withstanded. After the adsorption of the chemicals they will be baked dry, then mixed together with ceramic proppant at a certain ratio, and be pumped down below the wells to prop the fractures. The chemicals absorbed in the proppants can be released gradually during the fracturing process to prevent the oil well plugging, prolong the service life of the oil well, and reduce the operation cost of the second times chemical adding. The products have different sizes and shape, Wanli has been producing in small amount, can meet the special needs of customers.
All along, the customers hope the appearance of a kind of proppant which owns a density close to water (extremely low density), to reduce the use of fracturing fluid, lower down cost and make the process more environmental. Although there is no evident breakthrough currently, Wanli has been paying attention on it.
The road of developing new products is long, the process would be tough, however, we are keep working hard and never give up easily. We believe Wanli can bring new proppants categories to the global fracturing market very soon and provide more options for customers. Shouldered with the divine mission of servicing the oil industry, Wanli will keep growing up with China oil industry and world oil industry.
I’m not really familiar with the proppant manufacturing process, but you might take a look at the websites for Santrol (www.santrolproppants.com) and Momentive (http://ww2.momentive.com/Industry/oilfield_technology.aspx?id=256). These are the largest proppant manufacturing companies.
It would not be correct to say that one proppant is better than another; rather, one proppant may be better than another for a specific application. There are three basic categories of proppants: sand, resin coated sand (including cured and curable), and ceramic. Within each category there are a multitude of products and sizes. As you progress from sand to resin to ceramic, the strength of the proppant increases (and the price drastically increases as well).
In a shallow well, there the stress exerted on a proppant (after a frac) is relatively low because the overburden (all of the rock above the proppant) is relatively little. In a case like this, it would be best to use a sand, which has a high conductivity in a low stress environment (generally higher than a resin or ceramic proppant) and is very inexpensive. As a well gets deeper and the confining stress on the proppant increases, it is no longer possible to use sand because the sand will actually crush and lose all of its conductivity. As the confining stress increases you will need an increasingly stronger proppant, which is more expensive.
The conductivity of a resin or ceramic proppant at high confining stresses is much lower than that of sand at low confining stress, which is unfortunate, but just the nature of the beast.
On the subject of pre-cured versus curable resin coated proppant, each one has a particular purpose. The pre-cured resin is used in the main frac stages with the purpose of creating conductivity in the fracture. The curable resin is used at the very end of the frac. The curable resin is pumped with a chemical called an activator which caused the resin to become soft and bond with the adjacent grains of proppant. After the resin bonds, it becomes hard. This serves the purpose of preventing (or minimizing) proppant flowback. As fluids flow into the wellbore, they often carry with them proppant from the frac. This is a problem because it reduces the conductivity of the frac and can plug off perforations in the casing. Proppant flowback can also damage pumps, surface flowlines (through erosion), and surface separation equipment.
Ultimately, the proppant selection process should depend on economics. The engineer must determine how to optimize the economic return of a well based upon the price of proppant and its corresponding conductivey.
One can earn a Ph.D. in the subject of proppant selection.
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