Sustainable wastewater management from shale oil production wells: emerging opportunities and barriers

Abstract

During the production from shale oil formations, the produced water has been dedicated to different procedures such as chemical enhanced oil recoveries, drilling mud making (e.g., for various purposes of lubrication and cooling) and hydraulic fracturing. One of the main challenges of wastewater treatment corresponds to (TDS) total dissolved solids. To measure the required water needed for different processes, it is necessary to proceed with every step saving and then make an average to calculate the required freshwater. In this regard, we have selected five different oil wells with the same rock and reservoir characteristics. SOW#3 has the highest rate of treatment (26%) and SOW#1 has the minimum treated wastewater during hydraulic fracturing processes. It corresponds to the large volume of solid and oil particles, which remained in the treatment devices. However, it is observed that SOW#1 has the highest rate of treatment (32%) and SOW#4 has the minimum treated wastewater (14%) in chemical enhanced oil recovery methods. On the other hand, SOW#3 has the highest rate of treatment (27%) and SOW#5 has the minimum treated wastewater from drilling mud preparation and other well facilities. It is observed that SOW#1 has the highest rate of treatment (27%) and SOW#5 has the minimum saving water during hydraulic fracturing processes, SOW#1 has the highest rate of treatment (38%) and SOW#4 has the minimum saving water (9%).