Intensification 4.0 of hydraulic fracturing process involving incentive schemes and the use of matching law

Abstract

Due to the large amounts of water required in shale gas fracturing is necessary to find the correct planning and management of water resources. This work proposed a mathematical programming model capable of obtaining the optimal solution that considers the uncertainty associated with the amount of water required per well, as well as the fraction of water that returns to the surface. Economic incentive schemes are involved to promote the reuse of water and the use of treatments for contaminated water. The behavior of those involved is considered through the study of preference between treatments. This helps the process to be intensified by promoting the conservation of natural resources and decreasing flows of hazardous substances. The objective function is to reduce costs and satisfy water needs. The proposed approach was applied to a case study of the Marcellus and Barnett shale plays. The results show that there is better performance through the use of economic incentive schemes, demonstrating that costs can be reduced by 98.6% and freshwater consumption by 98.1%. In addition, knowing the preferences of the treatments it is possible to modify the incentives to favor process intensification 4.0 as well as the needs of the stakeholder decisions.