Numerical Simulation of Complex Hydraulic Fracture Development by Coupling Geo-mechanical and Reservoir Simulator

Abstract

Hydraulic fracturing is one of the standard techniques adopted by oil and gas industries to enhance production in unconditional reservoirs. Reservoir properties and treatment designs have a significant influence on the effectiveness of hydraulic fracturing treatments. Extensive studies on the mechanism of hydraulic fracturing have been conducted to optimize the hydraulic fracturing design. Recent advances in fracture diagnostic technology have brought new insights to the complex fracture geometry. Numerical simulation is an economical approach to investigate the generation of fracture geometry and its effect on post-treatment production enhancement. This work proposes a workflow to study the fracture complexity through coupling the geomechanical simulator Irazu and the reservoir simulator CMG. The geo-mechanical simulator is devised to simulate the hydraulic fracturing process employing the hybrid finite-discrete element method while the reservoir simulator CMG is used for the reservoir post-treatment production forecast.