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Survey and Analysis of Well Stimulation Performance
Author(s) -
Koenig Louis
Publication year - 1960
Publication title -
journal ‐ american water works association
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.466
H-Index - 74
eISSN - 1551-8833
pISSN - 0003-150X
DOI - 10.1002/j.1551-8833.1960.tb00497.x
Subject(s) - statistics , production (economics) , mathematics , economics , macroeconomics
A study has been made of the technical performance factors in water well stimulation drawn from 870 actual stimulation cases in 141 counties of 24 states. From the 483 sources providing usable data, cumulative frequency distribution curves were drawn for three criteria of technical performance: the ratio of specific capacities immediately after and immediately before treatment; the ratio of specific capacities immediately after treatment and at the time of constructing the original well; and, the ratio of the increment in specific capacity as a result of treatment to the specific capacity of the original well. For all types of treatments in all types of formations the median ratio indicated a 97 per cent improvement over specific capacity immediately before treatment, and a 20 per cent improvement over the original production of the well. Failures to achieve any improvement over the treated well were 11 per cent, whereas failures to achieve improvement over the original well were 43 per cent. The median increment of specific capacity achieved by treatment was 43 per cent of the specific capacity of the original well. When considered by type of formation, the data show that success has been definitely greater in consolidated formations than in unconsolidated formations. Based on improvement over the well before treatment, consolidated formations show a median of 141 per cent improvement, whereas unconsolidated formations show only 45 per cent improvement. When analyzed by treatment type, the data show a quite consistent pattern by all three criteria, the methods, arranged in ascending order of effectiveness, being surging, shooting, vibratory explosion, pressure acidizing, and fracturing. Water well stimulation has definitely been technically successful; some of the more advanced techniques that have already been adopted as conventional practice in crude‐oil production technology have shown higher performance records than the conventional techniques in the water industry. Judged by the wide geographic coverage of successful stimulation treatments, stimulation could probably be much more widely applied to improve groundwater production.