The Plug & Perf Challenge

According to the Energy Information Agency (EIA), daily US oil production rose steadily from its beginnings to an average of 9,637 kbbls/day in 1970 and then started to slowly retreat. Daily production reached its bottom in 2008 at 5,000 kbbls/day. In 2008, the US daily oil production started to increase rapidly, averaging an increase of 657,000 bbls/day (almost 240 MMbbls per year) each year through 2019.  This increase was done on the back of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracing.

North American shale formations are generally thinner layers of productive rock. Drilling wells horizontally through these thin layers enabled more contact with the targeted formation. Hydraulic fracing, using high volumes of water and sand under high pressure, broke this tight rock to enable production of the oil trapped within. With lateral lengths growing to 2+ miles in length, the well must be broken into sections so that pressure and water can be applied to individual portions of the rock. This is done primarily using a completion practice called Plug & Perf.

The Plug & Perf completion method is as follows:

1.      Drill & construct the well

2.      Create a circulation path at the toe (bottom) of the well

3.      Connect a bottom hole assembly (BHA) to a wireline including:

a.      Wireline Guns, used to perforate (blow holes) in the casing

b.      Setting tool, used to set a composite plug

c.      Composite Plug

4.      This BHA is then pumped to the proper location to set the plug

5.      Set the Plug

a.      Setting tool and BHA become released from the plug

6.      Pull the guns to the proper location and perforate the casing

a.      Repeat until all guns have been utilized

7.      Remove the wireline BHA from the well

a.      In some cases, drop a ball to land on plug and create full isolation

8.      Start the hydraulic frac Operation for this stage

9.      Repeat, steps 3-9 setting the plug above the previous stage’s last perforations

10.   Once the well has been fully frac’d, mill out the plugs leaving a clean wellbore

Since 2008, operators have found that increasing the length of the lateral and decreasing the length of each stage can increase the productivity of the well.

Over the past 3 years I have published several articles about composite plugs and the plug & perf completion operation. I took the time to combine these posts, along with additional information, into an ebook that is available for download below.