Manufacture of strong, lightweight, hollow proppants
AssigneeImaging Systems Technology
InventorsJoe K. Cochran, Jr., Thomas J. Pavliscak, Carol Ann Wedding
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An ultra strong, hollow sintered, impervious, metallic shell for use in structural applications including proppants for hydraulic fracturing. The shell is made of a maraging steel, low alloy steel, or stainless steel with a crush strength of about 3,000 psi or greater and a density of about 0.6 g/cm3 to about 2.5 g/cm3.
Claims5
A method of propping open a subterranean formation fraction that comprises introducing a hollow impervious proppant shell into the subterranean formation, said proppant shell being made of a maraging steel, a low alloy steel, or a stainless steel, and having a crush strength of about 5,000 psi to about 10,000 psi, said proppant shell being spherical with a diameter of about 90 microns to about 1,600 microns and having a shell thickness of about 15 to about 120 microns.
A method of propping open a subterranean formation fraction that comprises introducing a hollow impervious proppant shell into the subterranean formation, said proppant shell being made of a maraging steel, a low alloy steel, or a stainless steel, and having a crush strength about 5,000 psi to about 10,000 psi, said hollow proppant shell containing a coating of organic or inorganic coating, the geometric shape of the hollow proppant shell being a sphere, an ellipse, prolate spheroid, oblate spheroid, scalene spheroid, cylinder, or dome, with a shell wall thickness of about 10 to 300 microns.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.