Advances in hydraulic fracture characterization via borehole microseismic and strain monitoring

Abstract

We analyze the impact and challenges associated with microseismic monitoring in the development of unconventional reservoirs. We detail advanced methods that address some of these challenges and discuss emerging data analysis and acquisition technologies such as those provided by fiber-optic monitoring. During the development of unconventional resources, it is important to understand the stimulated rock volume obtained from the hydraulic fracturing treatment. Microseismic monitoring is one of the sources of information for estimating stimulated rock volume in which accurate hypocenter calculations provide the horizontal and vertical fracture geometry and extent. We developed hypocenter waveform-based relocation and collapsing techniques and demonstrated these on synthetic and field data to obtain an enhanced description of the fracture geometry. We further provide the initial analysis of a recently acquired data set composed of multiple monitoring wells instrumented with geophones and fiber optics operating simultaneously. Microseismic events recorded by the multiwell dual geophone/fiber setup show meaningful signal-to-noise ratio to enable a joint interpretation. Additional strain and temperature data provided by dynamic fiber-optic measurements extend the interpretation capabilities of the hydraulic fracturing phenomenon while providing an avenue for advanced research on fracture characterization.