This 1-day course covers the fundamental risks, rewards, and refinements for hydraulic fracture treatments in coalbed methane, tight gas, shale gas, and shale oil reservoirs. It relies heavily on field results and published studies to present a broad and fundamentals-based analysis of hydraulic fracturing for unconventional reservoirs.

Course content:

• Unconventional gas development overview
• Well design and completion basics
• Hydraulic fracturing mechanics
• Treatment design
• Treatment analysis
• Treatment preparation
• Treatment monitoring
• Cost-benefit analysis
• Underground risks and impacts
• Competing technologies and concepts
• Emerging technologies for unconventional reservoirs and market trends

Learning objectives:

• Understand the history and current status of unconventional gas development
• Review the geologic characteristics and locations of commercial plays
• Understand the key nomenclature and concepts
• Examine the overall preparation and process for hydraulic fracturing
• Understand why different reservoir conditions demand different designs
• Review field results and best practices from different basins
• Discuss the issues and steps to prepare for a treatment
• Examine options for monitoring the extent of created fractures
• Review the cost-benefit analysis process
• Understand the actual and potential environmental risks and impacts
• Examine the information feeding current public and foreign perceptions
• Discuss future technology and the market for unconventional development

The size, cost, and critical contributions of fracture treatments in the development of unconventional reservoirs is driving an increased need to fully understand and evaluate fracture treatments and their expected and actual impact under different reservoir conditions. Such information is not only needed to refine designs and cost-benefit analyses, but also to help educate regulators, surface owners, managers, and investors about the process and the actual level of environmental risk involved.

This course is intended for participants who evaluate or develop unconventional reservoirs, especially those who have little experience with or limited exposure to fracture treatments in unconventional reservoirs. Participants involved in the engineering, geo-science, regulatory, forecasting, land, field operations and service segments, will benefit from this course.

0.8 CEUs (Continuing Education Units) will be awarded for this 1-day course.

To receive a full refund, all cancellations must be received in writing no later than 14 days prior to the course start date. Cancellations made after the 14-day window will not be refunded. Send cancellation requests by email to trainingcourses@spe.org; by fax to +1.866.460.3032 (US) or +1.972.852.9292 (outside US); or mail to SPE Registration, PO Box 833836, Richardson, TX 75083.

For more details, please contact us at trainingcourses@spe.org.

Steve Hennings is the unconventional gas manager for Source Rock Engineering in Littleton, Colorado. He has over 30 years of field and reservoir experience in a large number of basins, covering every phase of development. His focus for the past decade has been on coal gas, coal mine methane and shale gas development. He has been involved in technical evaluations of development and exploration prospects in eight different countries including China, Australia, Canada, India and the United States.

In 2008, Hennings was awarded the prestigious annual Stefanko Award from the Society of Mining Engineers for his technical contributions. Hennings is a registered professional engineer. He holds a BS in petroleum engineering and an MS in finance.

• Coalbed Methane Development
• Coalbed Methane Reservoir Analysis
• Shale Evaluation and Development
• Unconventional Gas Fundamentals