The reliance upon and depletion of fossil fuels as an energy source puts pressure on individuals, communities, energy companies, and policy-makers. Hydraulic fracturing – known colloquially as fracking – as a method of drilling for oil and natural gas temporarily alleviates this pressure since it allows for the extraction previously inaccessible fossil fuels in shale rock deposits deep beneath the Earth’s surface. This has resulted in a nationwide “fracking boom,” which has come with its share of economic benefits. However, the process of fracking can be detrimental to human and environmental health. In reaction to the increasing development of this practice, many communities across the country are mobilizing against fracking. This thesis will focus on the grassroots activism against fracking in New York, where fracking was banned in December 2014, and in California, which is largely slated as the next frontier for the expansion of fracking and thus battleground for the fight against fracking. Using grassroots academic literature, media coverage of fracking and activism in each state, and interviews from organizers working in each state, this thesis will examine the motivations, frameworks, strategies, and tactics used in each grassroots campaign in order to offer lessons in successes and opportunities for improvement within these anti-fracking efforts and others across the country.

This work is about fracture conductivity; how to measure and model it based on experimental data. It is also about how to determine the relative importance of the factors that affect its magnitude and how to predict its magnitude based on these factors. We dynamically placed the slurry hereby simulating the slurry placement procedure in a field-scale fracture. We also used factorial and fractional factorial designs as the basis of our experimental investigation. The analysis and interpretation of experimental results take into account the stochastic nature of the process. We found that the relative importance of the investigated factors is dependent on the presence of outliers and how they are handled. Based on our investigation we concluded that the investigated factors arranged in order of decreasing impact on conductivity are: closure stress, polymer loading, flow back rate, presence of breaker, temperature and proppant concentration. In particular, we find that at high temperatures, fracture conductivity was severely reduced due to the formation of a dense proppant-polymer cake. Also, dehydration of the residual gel in the fracture at high flow back rates appears to cause severe damage to conductivity at higher temperatures. This represents a new way of thinking about the fracture cleanup process; not only as a displacement process, but also as a displacement and evaporative process. In engineering practice, this implies that aggressive flow back schemes are not necessarily beneficial for conductivity development. Also, we find that at low proppant concentrations, there is the increased likelihood of the formation of channels and high porosity fractures resulting in high fracture conductivities. The uniqueness of this work is a focus on the development of a conductivity model using regression analysis and also the illustration of a procedure that can be used to develop a conductivity model using dimensional analysis. We reviewed both methodologies and applied them to the challenge of modeling fracture conductivity from experimental studies.

Thesis (MA)--Stellenbosch University, 2014. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Hydraulic fracturing is a geo-engineering procedure designed to extract shale gas from below the earth’s surface. Shale gas is often considered a natural, alternative source of energy that has the potential to increase global energy supplies but the scientific literature is not unanimous regarding the implications that hydraulic fracturing may have, and whether it should continue (Vermeulen 2012). Given the contentious nature of hydraulic fracturing, this study investigates the ways in which hydraulic fracturing is represented in South African media texts. The study draws on Gee’s (1996) model of critical discourse analysis (CDA), which views discourse as a means to represent and reproduce social practices. Thus, the study conceptualises hydraulic fracturing as a social practice with an affiliated discourse or discourses, which represent or construct the process of hydraulic fracturing, as well as the participants involved and context in which it takes place. Furthermore, these discourses are also presumed to have the power to legitimise, and thus perpetuate hydraulic fracturing, or to critique it. Subsequent to an examination of 32 South African news articles, and a close and critical analysis of four of them, this study reveals that hydraulic fracturing is presented in both positive and negative ways. Where positive constructions prevail, writers draw on the perspectives of those working in multinational corporations (MNCs) to construct shale gas as a way to increase energy supplies and achieve economic prosperity. Where negative constructions prevail, writers draw on the perspectives of environmentalists to construct hydraulic fracturing as an environmentally-harmful activity that depletes natural resources. In doing so, the study not only highlights the media’s role in perpetuating confusion about hydraulic fracturing, but highlights dominant ideologies that give rise to common representations of hydraulic fracturing in media texts. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Hidrobreking is ’n geo-ingenieursprosedure waardeur ondergrondse skaliegas ontgin word. Skaliegas word dikwels beskou as ’n natuurlike, alternatiewe energiebron met die potensiaal om die wêreld-energievoorraad te verhoog, maar die wetenskaplike literatuur is verdeeld oor die effek van hidrobreking en die voortsetting van hierdie praktyk (Vermeulen 2012). Gegee die netelige aard van die onderwerp, word daar in hierdie studie ondersoek gedoen na die wyses waarop hidrobreking voorgestel word in Suid-Afrikaanse mediatekste. Die analise word gerig deur Gee (1996) se model van kritiese diskoersanalise waarvolgens diskoers dien as instrument in die voorstelling en voortsetting van sosiale praktyke. As sodanig word hidrobreking in hierdie studie gekonsepsualiseer as ’n sosiale praktyk met een of meer gepaardgaande diskoerse wat die proses van hidrobreking, die deelnmers in hierdie proses asook die konteks waarin hierdie proses plaasvind, voorstel of konstrueer. Verder word daar veronderstel dat hierdie diskoerse die krag het om hidrobreking te regverdig en sodoende voor te sit, of om dit te kritiseer. Op grond van die bestudering van 34 Suid-Afrikaanse nuusberigte en ’n kritiese ontleding van vier daarvan, word daar bevind dat hidrobreking op beide positiewe en negatiewe wyses voorgestel word. In die geval van positiewe konstruksies steun skrywers op die uitgangspunte van persone in multinasionale korporasies om skaliegas te konstrueer as ’n manier om energievoorrade te verhoog en ekonomiese vooruitgang te bevorder. In die geval van negatiewe konstruksies steun skrywers op die uitgangspunte van omgewingsdeskundiges om hidrobreking te konstrueer as ’n omgewingskadelike aktiwiteit wat natuurlike hulpbronne uitput. Hierdie bevindinge beklemtoon die rol van die media in die voortgesette verwarring aangaande hidrobreking, asook die dominante ideologieë wat aanleiding gee tot algemene voorstellings van hidrobreking in mediatekste.

Master of Landscape Architecture / Department of Landscape Architecture/Regional and Community Planning / Blake Belanger / In recent decades, traditional methods of oil and gas extraction in the United States have been fortified by hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. The process of fracking involves injecting water, aggregates, and chemicals into the earth to rupture rock that is trapping oil and gas. This process has unlocked access to once unobtainable reserves, and as a result, U.S. oil and gas production has continued to increase despite recurring forecasts that supplies would peak. While increased production has strengthened some sectors in the U.S. economy, it has also renewed a reliance on non-renewable energy, compromised the well-being of communities, and poses serious environmental threat. While research into the process of hydraulic fracturing and its effects are common, little discussion has been generated regarding the broader impacts of the systems required to construct, supply, and maintain fracking operations. The processes of hydraulic fracturing contain a dense array of components that effect both the present and future state of communities, environments, and economies. As energy demands grow and resources deplete, these millions of facilities will demarcate the wicked problems of a post-oil and gas future and reveal a dense system of derelict infrastructure and underutilized lands. This report presents the Fracklands. Fracklands are a comprehensive telling of the landscapes of hydraulic fracturing. They offer insight into what a dynamic and complex system of modern oil and gas extraction infrastructure looks like. After first defining fracking and discussing current practices and policies as grounds, I present a classification framework for defining the Fracklands. Organized by four approaches – Systems, Typologies, Trends and Futures – this Framework utilizes a set of descriptive methods conducted in three U.S. regions to present and discuss the Fracklands. Results reveal a more complete picture of fracking’s effects on the American landscape today, while giving hints of what the Fracklands will present in the future. The Fracklands are a little understood system of components and processes that profoundly affect land, people, place, and society. By presenting the Fracklands framework in this report, I aspire that planners, designers, and decision-makers will have a clear outline for better understanding the nature of this wicked problem. As a point of departure, I propose three unique design-based alternatives to address the future of the Fracklands and dilemmas yet materialized. With the Fracklands revealed, footholds are set for a methodology to be adapted and used in future study for understanding the ever-changing landscape of hydraulic fracturing.

The drive to find reliable sources of fuel that follow our green concerns and reduce our dependence on foreign sources of fossil fuels has pushed exploration and recovery of natural gas from within the United States to a top priority. Earthquakes generated from the use of hydraulic fracturing techniques and/or use of high pressure injection wells are occurring at an alarming rate due to increases in hydrocarbon exploration and recovery. While the link between earthquakes and hydrocarbon production is still uncertain, earthquake induced changes to groundwater chemistry are clear. Yet it has not been determined if repetitive, smaller earthquakes, i.e. earthquakes with magnitudes less than Mw<4.5, can result in similar disturbances to water chemistry as the more significant events have been proven to cause. Two known earthquake swarms, each having repetitive, small earthquake events, occurred in an intraplate setting in Faulkner County, Arkansas. Testing for groundwater chemical changes related to the timing of earthquake events and total energy released show that small earthquakes indeed create changes to groundwater chemistry most probably due to fluid intrusion from deep, chloride, calcium, and magnesium rich waters. The reduction of the United States dependence on foreign sources or finding green sources of fuel should not be the only mitigating factor for our decisions concerning our natural resources.

Orientador: Prof. Dr. Igor Fuser / Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal do ABC. Programa de Pós-Graduação em Energia, 2016. / Nos dias atuais a energia tem sido prioridade de vários governos pelo mundo, e vem despertando o interesse de grandes companhias. A energia tem um papel fundamental na sociedade moderna, onde a cada ano o consumo aumenta. A descoberta de enormes reservas de gás não convencional, ou conhecido também como shale gas, vem gerando grande expectativa no mercado mundial de energia. Os EUA têm a maior reserva mundial de shale gas, e são os pioneiros na sua exploração e produção. O Brasil possui a decima maior reserva mundial de shale gas. A sua reserva de shale gas equivale a quinze vezes as reservas de gás convencional do país em 2015 (MME, 2015). Devido a isso pode-se considerar as reservas brasileiras expressivas, o que vem despertando o interesse do país por suas reservas de shale gas. Esta dissertação tem como objetivo analisar o potencial do Brasil para a exploração e produção doshale gas. Para isso, foram consideradas variáveis do Brasil e EUA, como: o estado da arte do mercado regulatório, do domínio tecnológico, qualificação da mão de obra, conhecimento geológico, estrutura de preços, propriedade do solo e subsolo, e por fim as questões ambientais. Procurando assim fazer um paralelo entre essas variáveis dos dois países, verificando se o crescimento da exploração do shale gas americano pode ser repetido no Brasil. Além dessa comparação dos cenários energéticos, foi também levantado depoimentos de especialistas do setor de gás natural do Brasil, por meio de entrevista, contribuindo assim para um debate dos rumos da política energética brasileira. O resultado desta pesquisa mostrou que o Brasil não necessita explorar o shale gas neste momento e ainda não possui um mercado regulatório favorável e mercado interno desenvolvido para o desenvolvimento dos recursos de shale gas. Considerando tanto o aspecto econômico como o ambiental, a conclusão deste trabalho foi de que o Brasil não deve levar adiante a exploração do shale gas, dentro de um tempo previsível. / In the present day energy has been a priority of many Governments around the world, arousing the interest of big companies. Energy has a key role in modern society, where each year the consumption increases. The discovery of vast reserves of unconventional gas, or also known as shale gas comes generating great expectations in the global energy market. The us has the largest world reserve of shale gas, and are pioneers in their exploration and production. The Brazil has the world's largest reserve of decima shale gas. Your reservation of shale gas is equivalent to 15 times the conventional gas reserves in the country in 2015 (MME, 2015). Because of this you can consider the Brazilian reserves, expressive arousing the interest of the country for its reserves of shale gas. This dissertation aims to analyze the potential of Brazil for the exploration and production of shale gas. For this, the variables were considered Brazil and USA, as: the State of the art market's regulatory, technological domain, qualification of the workforce, geological knowledge, price structure, property of the soil and subsoil, and finally environmental issues. Looking for how to make a parallel between these variables of the two countries, noting the growth of shale gas American can be repeated in Brazil. In addition to this comparison of energy scenarios, was also lifted testimonials from industry experts, Brazil's natural gas through the interview, thus contributing to a discussion of the direction of the Brazilian energy policy. The result of this research showed that Brazil does not need to explore shale gas right now and still does not have a favourable regulatory and market internal market developed for resource development of shale gas. Considering both the economic aspect as the environmental, the conclusion of this work was that Brazil should not carry out the exploitation of shale gas, within a predictable time.

This thesis investigates three problems in the general area of environmental fluid mechanics. The first two problems are related to liquid or gas flow through clay-water suspensions, with relevance for the underground storage of radioactive waste and also for understanding the mechanism of eruption in mud volcanoes. The third problem centres on the different problem of mixing in a turbulent buoyant plume. First, the injection of gas and water from a central source into a two-dimensional layer of clay confined between two circular horizontal plates is investigated. This provides a model of the potential pressurisation and failure of the seal rock around a radioactive waste repository as may arise if gas is continuously generated in the repository. As the gas injection pressure is gradually increased the cell walls deform and the clay moves radially outwards. However, at a critical radius, the liquid-clay interface becomes unstable and a series of channels propagate through the clay. When one of the channels reaches the edge of the domain the gas escapes and the pressure is released. As a result, the domain relaxes by elastic deformation and the clay seals the channel. In this way, continuous fluid injection leads to episodic release of gas from the cell. The second problem concerns the flow of mud along a vertical conduit driven by the combined effect of reservoir pressure and buoyancy associated with the gas injected at the base of the conduit. This represents an analogue model of the eruption of a mud volcano, in which mud rises from a deep reservoir to the surface. I find that the pressure associated with the reservoir and any buoyancy force produced by the migration of gas from deep in the reservoir to the surface leads to a continuous eruption if the net pressure is greater than the yield stress of the clay. If the reservoir pressure falls during such an event, the eruption will eventually stop, once the pressure reaches a dynamic yield stress condition. Only later, if the reservoir pressure increases to the static yield stress of the clay will the eruption start again, and this can lead to a series of eruption cycles which depend on the non-Newtonian rheology of the clay. In contrast, if this pressure is smaller than the yield stress of the clay, a series of episodic gas burst events can occur until the conduit is cleared of mud. The third problem relates to the mixing in a turbulent buoyant plume. Through a series of new experiments and some complementary theoretical modelling I show that the mixing in a turbulent plume is strongly affected by the eddies and leads to significant longitudinal dispersion in the flow. The implications of the modelling for determining the residence time distribution of the fluid in the plume is discussed.

Orientador: Osvaldo Luís Manzoli / Banca: Flavia de Oliveira Lima Falcão / Banca: Leonardo José do Nascimento Guimarães / Resumo: A técnica de fraturamento hidráulico é amplamente utilizada na indústria petrolífera para aumentar a permeabilidade da rocha-reservatório numa região próxima ao poço e permitir a extração, e consequente produção, de hidrocarbonetos armazenados em seus poros. Primeiramente a rocha é perfurada criando-se um poço e então injeta-se fluido a uma pressão suficientemente alta para fraturar a rocha. A injeção contínua de fluido permite que as fraturas se propaguem pelo reservatório, formando assim canais de alta permeabilidade. A modelagem e simulação computacional de fraturamento hidráulico são complexas em função da física envolvida no processo. O presente trabalho objetiva o estudo da formação e propagação de fraturas induzidas hidraulicamente em meios rochosos de baixa permeabilidade e também tem o propósito de verificar se a metodologia adotada é capaz de reproduzir características apresentadas num processo de fraturamento hidráulico, como a pressão necessária para causar a ruptura da rocha. Para tal, apresenta-se a técnica de fragmentação da malha utilizando elementos finitos de elevada razão de aspecto (ou elementos de interface) para representar a fratura, aos quais são atribuídas relações constitutivas baseadas na mecânica do dano. Além disso, os elementos de interface também possuem um acoplamento hidromecânico capaz de representar o canal de alta permeabilidade devido à ocorrência da fratura. Os resultados obtidos mostraram que os elementos de interface asso... (Resumo completo, clicar acesso eletrônico abaixo) / Abstract: The hydraulic fracturing technique is widely used to increase the permeability of reservoirs in the vicinity of the well and to allow the extraction and subsequent production of hydrocarbons trapped in its pores. Firstly, the rock is drilled, creating a well and then a fluid is injected at a sufficiently high pressure to fracture the rock. The continuous fluid injection allows the fractures to propagate through the reservoir, thereby forming some high permeability paths. The computer modeling and simulation of hydraulic fracturing are complex due to the physics involved in the process. This work aims to study the formation and propagation of hydraulically induced fractures in rocky media with low permeability and also aims to verify if the adopted methodology is able to reproduce the characteristics presented in a hydraulic fracturing process, as for instance, the required pressure to cause the breakdown of the rock. For this purpose, it is presented the mesh fragmentation technique using finite elements with a high aspect ratio (or interface elements) to represent the fracture, which are assigned constitutive relations based on damage mechanics. Besides, the interface elements also have a hydromechanical coupling which is able to represent the high permeability path due to the fracture. The results showed that the interface elements associated with the mesh fragmentation technique were able to represent both the formation and the propagation of hydraulically induc... (Complete abstract click electronic access below) / Mestre

[pt] Este trabalho teve como objetivo estudar as características de filtração estática e dinâmica de um fluido usado em fraturamento hidráulico à temperatura ambiente. Para sua realização foi projetado, desenvolvido e qualificado metrologicamente um simulador que permitisse efetuar testes de filtração estática e dinâmica. Foram realizadas filtrações com um fluido newtoniano (água) e um não newtoniano (HPGUAR-BO lbm/1000gal). / [en] This research intended to study the characteristcs of dynamic and static leakoff of a fluid in hydraulic fracturing at room temperature. A test apparatus was designed, constructed and metrologically qualified in order to carry out dynamic and stactic leakoff test. Leakoffs with a Newtonian fluid (water) and with a non-Newtonian one (HPGUAR-BO lbm/1000 gal) were performed.

Kyoto University (京都大学) / 0048 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(工学) / 甲第15338号 / 工博第3217号 / 新制||工||1484(附属図書館) / 27816 / 京都大学大学院工学研究科社会基盤工学専攻 / (主査)教授 石田 毅, 教授 松岡 俊文, 教授 三ケ田 均 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当