The technique isn’t new, but you’ll see the words refracturing or refracking more and more throughout 2016. Margins for the industry have dropped, and operators need to optimize the use of their wells. According to Carl Larry, consultant for oil and gas at Frost & Sullivan, refracking is the next step to increasing production without increasing costs.
“When you refrack a well or a whole pad of wells, you don’t have an upfront cost for the land and that’s huge,” Larry said. “The beauty of refracking is you don’t have to move equipment very far, there’s no cost for additional equipment and you don’t have to pay people again to drill on their land. All of these things drastically drop the production cost of a refracked well.”
By 2020, refracked wells will account for as much as 11 percent of horizontal wells fracked in the U.S., said the IHS Energy Insight Report, “To Frac or Refrac: Prospects for Refracturing in the United States.”
“With the new year, new technologies and ideas are coming into play in the form of refracking,” Larry said. “Refracking is the practice of going back into the already fracked well but drilling at a different angle or using different chemical injections. Enhanced oil recovery and the technology behind it will be big in 2016.”
Larry, who is based in Houston, emphasized a lot of well operating companies he works with are starting to refrack, which has been very beneficial to them, and he’s already seen different types of refracking methods.
“When refracking, companies will use larger piping because the newer technology allows this,” he said. “For example, an operator that used to be able to drill a mile deep and 300-400 yards horizontally can now drill 600-800 yards horizontally. The technology wasn’t there a year ago for this distance. The direction, girth of the pipe and chemicals all make a big difference in terms of refracking, and there’s not a lot of risk since the drilling is done in the same well.”
According to IHS, operating companies are finding out there’s more oil they can extract in the existing wells by using simple techniques, but they will need to develop these techniques on a larger scale going forward.
“In response to lower oil prices, E&Ps and service companies in particular have shown increasing interest in horizontal well refracturing,” said Christopher Robart, managing director, unconventional resources at IHS Energy. “However, while refracturing has potential to leverage improved completion techniques to increase production while avoiding drilling and facilities costs associated with a new well, IHS research indicates there is a great deal of uncertainty about the viability of large-scale refracturing that must first be overcome.”
IHS stated refracking technology is still in its infancy, and a large-scale refracking program is the most important step that can be taken to advance it.
“To get better at something you have to repeat it and refine processes; you have to experiment,” Robart said. “What refracturing needs now is a new innovator to step up, invest capital and take risks to refine the technologies and lower costs. For refracturing to advance significantly, we need the next George Mitchell to come forward.”
Larry explained refracking is part of a new generation of oil production.
“Refracking certainly allows companies to make more with less, acting as a temporary solution,” Larry said. “But the greater question is: How will the industry continue to keep production high in the existing wells three to five years from now?
“When you talk about refracking, we could run out of good fortune. Can our technology stay ahead of the curve?”
For more information about the latest industry trends and best practices, visit BICMagazine.com.
