Monster fracs, superlaterals are here to stay

Remember when that kid you didn’t like in middle school used to tell you to ‘go pound sand’? Somebody who later became a petroleum engineer has heeded that advice and began to work on the monster frac.

Sand, known in the oil and gas industry as proppant, is what’s hot. In today’s world of improving well efficiency, creating bigger fracs and drilling extra-long “superlaterals,” companies are finding that in some formations more sand is better—a lot more. In some cases production from the wells has shot way up.

Chesapeake’s Record 25,000-Ton Monster Frac and U.S. Silica’s 19,000-Ton Sand Shipment Set Records

Chesapeake Energy (ticker: CHK) made some announcements at its analyst day last week, one of which was that it had set a record with the amount of sand it used in one of its monster fracs. Chesapeake called it Prop-A-Geddon after it pumped 50,185,300  pounds of sand down into a well during the completion. That’s 25,000 tons of sand. The company said moving from a “vintage” completion (pre-2012) with 1,500 pounds per foot to “Prop-A-Geddon” with more than 3,000 pounds per foot (2016), the overall cumulative production has increased 70%. Prop-A-Geddon was a natural gas well in Louisiana.

Chesapeake’s Record 25,000-Ton Monster Frac and U.S. Silica’s 19,000-Ton Sand Shipment Set Records

Halliburton, North America’s largest frac services provider, confirmed it had executed the record frac for Chesapeake.

Another record: moving enough sand for monster fracs from Illinois to Texas

Halliburton (ticker: HAL) and U.S. Silica Holdings, Inc. (ticker: SLCA) announced Oct. 16th that the companies had moved a record breaking unit train carrying nearly 19,000 tons of U.S. Silica White® frac sand from Ottawa, Ill., to Elmendorf, Texas. According to the companies’ press release, the train was the largest frac sand unit of its kind shipped to date in North America, arrived today via the BNSF railroad. Unit trains reduce transit time from mine to transload facility.

Chesapeake’s Record 25,000-Ton Monster Frac and U.S. Silica’s 19,000-Ton Sand Shipment Set Records

“Unit train delivery, leveraging our combined logistical assets, is the most efficient and cost effective way to deliver high volumes of sand in the time constraints required,” said Don Weinheimer, senior vice president and president of Oil and Gas for U.S. Silica.

The unit train, which originated at U.S. Silica’s largest plant in Ottawa, Ill., took five days to build and was loaded with 30/50 and 40/70 U.S. Silica White® frac sand. It was received at the Halliburton Elmendorf South Texas Sand Plant, which can handle two 115 car unit trains simultaneously and can hold 40,000 tons in its eight silos. The facility is located within the Alamo Junction Rail Park in Elmendorf, about seven miles from the company’s South Texas Operations Center in southern Bexar County.


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