Foam Fracturing: Theories, Procedures And Results

Although many different types of reservoirs have been stimulated with foam, the primary zones of interest in E. Kentucky and southern West Virginia have been the Berea sandstone and the Devonian shales. Due to the nature of these formations (i.e., low permeability, low bottom-hole pressure, and water sensitivity), foam fracturing has been a successful technique. This study presents the basic background theory of foam and presents several basic treatment designs which have been used successfully in the Devonian shales and Berea sandstone. Production histories on a number of wells fractured with foam are compared to production histories of offset wells which conventionally were fractured with gelled water. In the comparisons, foam fracturing was found to give production results either as good as, or better than, conventional fracturing with gelled water. 21 references.