New Exxon Proppant Tech Enhances Permian Basin Well Recovery

Exxon Mobil is leveraging its scale and engineering prowess to boost Permian Basin production.

The U.S. supermajor is seeing an up to 15% uplift in EURs from Permian wells completed with lightweight proppant technology designed in-house by Exxon engineers.

Exxon first mentioned the proprietary frac tech to investors late last year. The lightweight proppant is based on petroleum coke derived from Exxon’s refining operations.

The company is now setting up the supply chains and logistics systems to support wider deployment in the Permian, Exxon Mobil Chairman and CEO Darren Woods told analysts.

“We’re as enthusiastic, if not more, associated with the value opportunity that we’re seeing there,” he said during Exxon’s first-quarter earnings call on May 2.

“Going forward, it’s going to continue to be a critical part of the portfolio,” he added.

Lightweight proppants are old news in the unconventional industry. Inventors have tinkered on designs for decades to unlock more from unconventional basins, where producers recover only around 10% of the oil in place.

But the adoption of lightweight frac tech was limited due to technical issues downhole, like setting near the wellbore. High costs forced producers to find cheaper options, often in-basin sand proppant.

By manufacturing a coke-based proppant from its own refineries, Exxon aims to significantly lower costs for lightweight tech.

Exxon has ambitious growth plans for the Permian, the key unconventional asset in its global portfolio. It got a major boost through the $60 billion acquisition of Pioneer Natural Resources, which closed last year.

Exxon aims to grow Permian production to 2 MMboe/d in 2027 and 2.3 MMboe/d in 2030.

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Patent details

Exxon engineers hold several patents related to producing lightweight proppants based on refinery coke, a coal-like byproduct of refining oil into fuels like gasoline and diesel, according to documents Exxon filed with the U.S. Patent and Trade Office (USPTO).

Proppant particulates are made from fluid coke, low-density materials that are specially treated to enhance quality and durability for hydraulic fracturing.

The coke-derived proppants have a bulk density of less than 0.9 g/cm3, significantly lighter than traditional sand proppants.

They also exhibit a high crush strength of about 3,000 psi to 12,000 psi, which is comparable to sand proppants.

Exxon is using a blend of sand and lightweight proppant in certain Permian well completions.

Sand is “perfectly acceptable” close to the wellbore but is too heavy to be transported to the far ends of long laterals, Exxon said during a corporate update in December.

But the coke-derived lightweight proppant travels further down the length of the lateral while maintaining sufficient strength to keep fractures open.

Exxon is drilling longer Permian laterals after completing the Pioneer deal, which massively boosted its Midland Basin land position. The company is already drilling 4-mile laterals in the Midland and Delaware basins.

Variable rate frac

A separate patent held by Exxon engineers focuses on completions with variable rate fracking techniques.

The patented method also includes a lightweight proppant made from petroleum coke, polyolefin or a polyaromatic hydrocarbon resin, USPTO records show.

Instead of a constant rate, the pumping rate is cycled up and down over time, helping improve fracture complexity and conductivity.

Combining lightweight proppants with the variable pumping rate also helps prevent proppant settling near the wellbore.

“Frankly, like a lot of the technical advances that we make in the company, we generally surprised ourselves with the improvements that we make over time as we gain experience through deployment,” Woods said of the proppant tech during first-quarter earnings.

Exxon only piloted the coke-based proppant in 50 Permian wells last year. The company aims to deploy the tech in over 200 Permian wells this year.

At peak deployment, Exxon forecasts call for up to 2 million tons of lightweight proppant per year. But scaling up production will take time and investment in Exxon’s refining segment, the company said in December.

Hart Energy has reached out to Exxon Mobil for more information on the proppant tech.

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