• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.128-137
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• 2011

The shut-in pressure calculated in common hydrofracturing test for vertical borehole equals generally to the minimum horizontal principal stress, so it should be considered as an essential parameter for determining the in-situ stress regime around the rock mass. It shows usually an ambiguous value in pressure-time history curves, however, because of the relationship between the behavior of hydraulic fractures and the condition of remote stress regime. In this study, a series of numerical analyses have been carried out to compare several methods for determining the shut-in pressure during hydrofracturing. The hydraulic-mechanical coupling has been applied to numerical analysis for simulating the fracture propagation by hydraulic pressure, and the different discontinuity geometry has been considered in numerical models to examine the effect of numerical element shape on fracture propagation pattern. From the numerical simulations with the four different discontinuity geometries, it was revealed that the shut-in pressure obtained from graphical methods rather than statistical method was relatively small. Consequently a care should be taken in selecting a method for determining the shut-in pressure when a stress anomaly around borehole and a fracture propagation with complicate mechanism are considered.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.5 no.4
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• pp.323-335
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• 1995

지열에너지 개발의 기본적 개념은 지하 심부의 고온건조암체에 시추공을 이용한 수압파쇄를 실시하여 고온건조암체내에 인공파쇄대를 형성함으로써 유체의 유동회로를 구축하여 지열에너지의 회수를 도모하는 것이다. 본 논문에서는 수압파쇄균열의 발전방향 조절문제와 관련하여, 초고압수 절삭장치를 이용, 수압파쇄공 내에 인공슬롯을 형성하여 수압파쇄를 실시함으로써 균열의 발전방향을 조사하였으며, 수압파쇄에 의한 파쇄대내로의 유체순환실험을 통해 지열수의 유동특성을 규명하였다. 이를 위해 모델에 종균열과 횡균열을 형성시키고 균열내에 주입되는 물의 주입률, 정상류압력, 흐름저항을 조사하고, 이 결과를 이용하여 전산모델링을 수행하였다. 인공절리면에 대한 투수시험에서는 10$0^{\circ}C$까지의 온도변화에 따라 투수계수가 증가하였으며, 봉압 증가에 따라 증가율이 현저히 감소하였다.

• Journal of the Korean GEO-environmental Society
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.43-53
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• 2006

Hydraulic fracturing is an important and abundant process in both industrial applications and natural environments. The formation of hydraulic fractures includes nucleation, growth, and termination in numerous rock types and stress regimes, at scales ranging from microns to many kilometers. As a result, fracture segmentation, commonly observed at all scales and in all geo-materials, contributes to this complexity in many ways. In particular, the mechanical interaction of fracture segments strongly affect almost all hydraulic fracturing processes. In this paper, the segmented fracture opening deformation in rock by hydraulic fracturing is quantified using boundary collocation method and is compared with non-interacting single fracture.

• Journal of the Korean GEO-environmental Society
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• v.10 no.6
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• pp.135-141
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• 2009

Fracturing technique using fluid injection into the borehole is widely used technology in the industry for the geothermal heat, oil, and gas extraction. Dealing with fluid-driven natural fractures such as dike and vein indirectly, design technology would be improved by adapting their principles. In this paper, mechanical interaction between the segments is evaluated by modeling highly segmented and closely spaced fluid-driven natural fractures. The number of segments is 71 with 3,339 measured apertures in which the interaction is considerably predicted. To evaluate mechanical interaction, boundary collocation method is used and the net pressure is calculated by using least square method to fit measured apertures. As a result, in case that mechanical interaction is considered, two pressures as fitting parameters are sufficient to capture measured apertures.

• The Journal of Engineering Geology
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.233-244
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• 2017

We conducted hydraulic fracturing experiments on cement samples to investigate the dependency of fracture propagation on the viscosity of injection fluid and the in situ stress state. Ten cubic samples (20 cm side length) were produced using cement that was cured in water for more than one month. Samples were placed in a tri-axial compression apparatus with three independent principal stresses. An injection hole was drilled and the sample was hydraulically fractured under a constant injection rate. We measured injection pressures and acoustic emissions (AE) during the experiments, and investigated the fracture patterns produced by hydraulic fracturing. Breakdown pressures increased exponentially with increasing viscosity of the injection fluid. Fracture patterns were dependent on differential stress (i.e., the difference between the major and minor principal stresses). At low differential stress, multiple fractures oriented sub-parallel to the major principal stress axis propagated from the injection hole, and in some samples the fracture orientation changed during propagation. However, at high differential stress, a single fracture propagated parallel to the major principal stress axis. AE results show similar patterns. At low differential stress, AE source locations were more widespread than at high differential stress, consistent with the fracture pattern results. Our study suggests that hydraulic fracturing during shale gas extraction should be performed parallel to the orientation of minimum differential stress.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.23 no.6
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• pp.470-479
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• 2013

Hydraulic fracturing is used as a method for promoting the fluid flow in the rock and, in the energy field such as geothermal development and the development of sales gas, many studies has been actively conducted. In many cases, hydraulic fracturing is not performed in isotropic rock and especially in the case of sedimentary rocks, hydraulic fracturing is conducted in the transverse isotropic rock. The direction of the crack growth on hydraulic fracturing does not necessarily coincides with the direction of maximum principal stress in the transverse isotropic rock. Therefore, in this study, bonded particle model with hydro-mechanical coupling analysis was adopted for analyzing the characteristics of hydraulic fracturing in transverse isotropic rock. In addition, experiments of hydraulic fracturing were conducted in laboratory-scale to verify the validity of numerical analysis. In this study, the crack growth and crack patterns showed significant differences depending on the viscosity of injection fluid, the angle of bedding plane and the influence of anisotropy. In the case of transverse isotropic model, the shear crack growth due to hydraulic fracturing appeared prominently.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.327-337
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• 2016

In this study, laboratory hydraulic fracturing tests are carried out to evaluate the effects of the cleavage anisotropy of Pocheon granite. Breakdown pressure is smaller when cracks are generated to the direction of rift plane in constant pressurization rate condition because of higher microcracks density. Besides not only injection rate changes but also the amount of injection pressure for fracture initiation and crack expansion is detected while testing due to internal deformation. Pressurization rate is higher while hydraulic fracture testing with constant injection rate condition in case of the specimen which has rift plane perpendicular to borehole because there are much flow paths to penetrate compared to the specimen which has hardway plane perpendicular to borehole. Observation by X-ray CT scanning shows that almost all of cracks due to hydraulic fracturing are generated to the direction of plane which has higher microcrack density that is rift plane or grain plane.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.21 no.9
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• pp.45-52
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• 2005

Recent observations based on geological evidence and laboratory tests confirm that complex segmentation of hydraulic fractures is common phenomena. It is expected that the segmentation causes mechanical interaction between the fractures and affects fracture opening and measured net pressure. In this study, therefore, the opening of the fractures is computed using boundary collocation method to evaluate the mechanical interaction quantitatively. Also, improved boundary collocation method is suggested to evaluate the displacement of the fracture wall accurately and the reliability of this method is confirmed by comparing with that of the finite element method.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.13-19
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• 2015

This paper presents a hydraulic fracture propagation model to describe propagation more realistically. In propagating the hydraulic fractures, we have used two criteria: maximum tangential stress to determine the fracture initiation angle and whether a hydraulic fracture intersects a natural fracture. The model was validated for the parameters relevant to fracture propagation, such as initiation angle and crossing ability through natural fracture. In order to check whether a hydraulic fracture crosses a natural fracture, the model results on crossing state excellently matched with the experimental data. In the sensitivity analysis for direction of maximum horizontal stress, frictional coefficient of fracture interface, and natural fracture orientation, the results show that hydraulic fracture intersects natural fracture, and then, propagated suitably with theoretical results according to fracture interaction criterion. In comparison of this model against vertical fracture approach, it was ascertained that there are discrepancies in fracture connectivity and stimulated reservoir volume.

• Journal of the Korean GEO-environmental Society
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.65-71
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• 2009

Hydraulic fracturing technology has been widely applied in the industry for the recovery of the natural resources such as gas, oil and geothermal heat from hot dry rock. During hydraulic fracturing stimulation, multiple cracks are created resulting in mechanical interaction between cracks. Such an interaction influences obtaining hydraulic fracturing key parameters (crack opening, length, and borehole net pressure). The boundary collocation method (BCM) has been proved to be very effective in considering mechanical interaction. However, for better confidence, it needs to be verified by comparison with analytical solutions such as stress intensity factors. In this paper, three cases, single fracture in remote uniaxial tension, single fracture in remote shear stress field and two arbitrary segments in an infinite plane loaded at infinity are considered. As a result, the BCM is proved to be valid technique to consider mechanical interaction between cracks and can be used to estimate the hydraulic fracturing parameters such as opening of the fracture, and so on.