This is a link to the process.
Schlumberger has a huge operation in the Bakken and a huge industrial park east of Williston.
Schlumberger describes the process as this:
To allow more fracture conductivity in conventional fracturing jobs, HiWAY channel fracturing fundamentally changes the way that proppant fractures generate conductivity. It engineers stable flow channels into the proppant pack that are connected from the tip of the fracture back toward the wellbore, creating the optimal connection between the reservoir and the wellbore. The productivity of the fracture is decoupled from the actual permeability of the proppant used, so rather than flowing through the proppant pack, hydrocarbons flow through stable channels—meaning infinite fracture conductivity.Bottom line: "rather than flowing through the proppant pack that has just been pumped explosively into the shale, the oil flows through stable channels."
CLR's Harold Hamm says this about "highway fracking":
And we just pumped our first hiway frac, which pulses proppant into the frac zone instead of injecting it under continuous but increasing concentrations.Note: the SeekingAlpha transcript had "hiway" spelled slightly different but I corrected it to eliminate search engine confusion.
