Comparison of chosen sands from Algerian quarry and dune aeolian as proppants used in hydraulic fracturing engineering

Abstract

Sand as proppants are synthetic or natural grains used for holding fractures open around the wellbore in the gas / oil well drilling industry to enhance fluid extraction after hydraulic fracturing. These proppant must have an ideal spherical shape with two values defined: roundness and sphericity. The supporting agent's other important characteristic is its solubility in acid. The acid solubility test determines a supporting agent's suitability for use in fracturing process where the supporting agent may come into contact with acids as well as the resistance to strength. The results shows that In all tests of sphericity and roundness dune sands proppants performed better than sand from the quarries. Also, results indicate that quarry sands are more solubility tolerant and do not exceed the 3% standard's criterion. Finally, we found that aoelian sands are resistant to the exerted stresses, except for one which has no good resistance to crushing.