Comprehensive fracture diagnostics experiment. Part II. Comparison of seven fracture azimuth measurements

A great deal of effort has been devoted recently to find geophysical techniques for measuring the hydraulic fracture azimuth. This paper discusses a comparison of seven different measurements used to determine the azimuth in a sandstone formation at a depth of 1000 ft (320 m). The azimuth was determined as N95E, but significant differences existed between some of the results. This is of fundamental importance since in developing new measurements, the limits of these must be found and honored. Of particular interest are the results from microseismic monitoring. The lack of results suggests that remote (e.g., surface) monitoring for seismic events may be impractical for normal, sedimentary, hydrocarbon-bearing formations. 33 refs., 6 figs., 3 tabs.