Elmworth Mid Montney Completion OptimizationI believe there's a lot of room to improve the consistency of well performance with future RMP Elmworth wells. Hybrid slick water fracs have been shown to be effective but in my experience that style works better in places like Kakwa where the Montney is significantly overpressured (~11 to 13+ kPa/m) and even more gassy. RMP's land I think falls in the more normal to moderately under-pressured area (slightly <10 kPa/m). That Montney doesn't have as much jam to clean itself up as good. I don't have the details on the completions for the three Elmworth Hz's but it was reported that the two done in 2017 at 8-25 and 4-18 were hybrid slick water fracs. It would be interesting to compare this year's completions with the 3-22 well.
Other operators with underpressured to normally pressured Montney have been able to significantly exceed slick water IP rates by using N2 foam fracs (using medium quality foams in the 65 to 75% range if memory serves). Also placing more proppant per meter (to over 1.2 tonne/meter) and decreasing stage spacing to the 35m to 50m I think would yield some very good results. How much improvement to expect through optimization? I could see a very good probability of subsequent wells performing more like the 1130 boed 3-22 well.
Personally I would stay away from using CO2 as an energizer even though the cleanup potential in an oil rock is superior because of tubular corrosion issues affecting wellbore integrity. Also I like the NCS sliding sleeze system as a way to quickly place a large number of stages with reduced risk. If there's a sand-off the proppant can be readily back circulated out through the coil and there's a true "dead leg" pressure instead of a calculated one giving more control over the completion quality during placement.
The point here is design tweaking does affect the results and significant improvements aren't only possible but probable. I really like the 2518m long lateral drilled at 4-18. That kind of extension will reduce the number of pads and increase reserves per well increasing capital efficiency. Some very good things can start happening once cash flow is initialed from the first three Hz's. My gut feel is that the two 2017 wells with lower than type curve initial rates will eventually cleanup but over a longer period of time which will be reflected in a lower than type curve decline rate. Time will tell, of course.