We have several new company updates to share!
MuLTipEl
Next week, we are releasing Egor Dontsov’s new crack propagation algorithm, MuLTipEl. We have been internally testing and refining for months and are finally ready to do a full rollout. I am very excited about this release. It is a major new development in the field of fracture modeling. The algorithm tracks the position of the crack tip within each crack element. This gives us unlimited spatial resolution to handle propagation across thin layers, even if the overall fracture element thickness is 10s of feet.
This is an important development for simulation runtime because it enables high accuracy 3D crack propagation calculations, even if using a relatively coarse mesh. This is important because if we run simulations with an ultrafine mesh, they become impractically slow to run on field-scale problems. But at the same time, we need to account for the detailed layering and heterogeneity of the formation.
Egor wrote an arXiv paper on the algorithm and gave a talk for ARMA. We are also preparing an SPE paper giving applications and testing on field scale problems, and he is planning to submit a version of the arXiv paper to a journal.
Earlier this year, we released support for corner-point gridding, which means that we can simulate these fracture geometries within complex (and practical) geocellular grids. We achieve numerical accuracy for flow and crack propagation, with a nonconforming mesh, by using multiscale, subgrid techniques like MuLTipEl and the ‘1D submesh method’.
ResFrac Happenings
Next update – you probably noticed, we have a new website, and a new logo! The new logo is an ‘evolution’ on the previous design, rather than a totally new concept. Both depict a stylized representation of three hydraulic fractures.
Hopefully, you like the new designs. Throughout, we’ve sprinkled some of our favorite (non-proprietary) ResFrac images and movies, and quotes and case studies from operators. Please note the new ‘FAQs’ section on the software page, the page about our industry studies, and the newly reorganized library/blog sections.
Looking out over the next few months, there are several notable things on the horizon. First, we have our annual ResFrac Symposium on July 29. It is a hybrid event, with both in-person and remote attendance options.
Second, we have finished an end-to-end implementation of our automated history matching and optimization capability and are in the process of internal testing and refinement. It will be released sometime in the fall. I expect this to be a hugely popular addition to the ResFrac platform. Some of my favorite aspects: (1) seamless integration with the user-interface and the cloud, making it easy to set up history matching and optimization, and easy to visualize the results, and (2) integration of Bayesian concepts so that we provide a probabilistic assessment of confidence and nonuniqueness. Stay tuned!
Geothermal
Third update – there has continued to be growing attention to geothermal energy. We have seen a significant uptick in our own geothermal business and expect that trend to continue. I will be speaking at the upcoming PIVOT 2021 conference on July 20, and Garrett will be speaking at the upcoming GRC meeting in October. We believe that multistage hydraulic stimulation offers tremendous promise for geothermal and want to get out that message!
I hope you enjoy the new website, and if you have any comments or questions, please reach out and let me know!
