Data mining and statistical analysis of completions in the Canadian Montney formation

This thesis documents a data-mining study and statistical analysis of well completion methods and their impact on production for more than 3300 horizontal wells in the Canadian Montney resource play. The statistical software JMP is used to analyze well and production data for both horizontal Montney gas and oil wells, examining production trends with changes in completion parameters, such as the type of completion, fluid volume pumped, proppant load, number of fracture stages and completion costs. The analysis also provides a general understanding of average treatment characteristics, and how completions have changed with time for the Montney play. Among the many results of this work, it is shown that there is a limit to adding stages to well completions in the Montney. While additional completed stages may increase cumulative recovery, the recovery per stage decreases after a point. This conclusion is consistent with recent findings (VISAGE and Jim Gouveia 2014). In addition, findings of the study clearly demonstrate that wells with the smallest frac fluid load recovery have the best cumulative recovery with time, and spending more for the completion translates into higher recovery. This work is important as it is the first field-wide statistical review of wells completed in the Montney using large up to date dataset --Abstract, page iii