COHESIVE ZONE FINITE ELEMENT-BASED MODELING OF HYDRAULIC FRACTURES

Hydraulic fracturing is a powerful technology used to stimulate fluid production from reservoirs.The fully 3-D numerical simulation of the hydraulic fracturing process is of great importance to the effcient application of this technology,but is also a great challenge because of the strong nonlinear coupling between the viscous flow of fluid and fracture propagation.By taking advantage of a cohesive zone method to simulate the fracture process,a finite element model based on the existing pore pressure cohesi...