Not a fracking engineer myself, but I believe that yes, they inject sand with water (so it will flow).

Do they pump a mixture of water and sand? I can't see how they can "pump" dry sand, but then, I'm not a drilling engineer.

Brilliant!

Hmm...maybe we could use them to plug up the holes once there is no more oil?...got it...use them to plug up the Sink holes in Florida!
Problem solved.

Wait a minute, thought. Maybe we can use them as sources of oil and grease...

Or is that just the slime and much even pond scum shies away from? ;)

Yea, they usurp so much and are so ridiculous the oil wouldn't flow between them...they would just blob up with no spaces inbetween...

After watching the recent kerfuffle over Cavenaugh and the Supreme Court, there are quite a few politicians who aren't "worth their sand" when they are objecting simply to object and have pre-written placards and social media notices literally with blanks to fill in. And I'm talking the worthless sand - not this useful stuff!

First comes the actual fracturing, where they drill the hole and then pump steam in to try to break the rocks up and create small fractures for the oil to flow through. The cracks will close (and stop the flow of oil) unless there is some way to hold them open, so they pump sand in there to wedge the cracks open.

Darn! I was hopping that the sand under the pool I just go rid of was worth something...oil isn't gona flow through "Dead sand"...

I wonder, Blair...if we could use those politicians instead of sand...might be worth a try!

I got the part about fracking...what I want to know is what part sand is supposed to play in this?
This is obviously a new technology (sand), so I'm wondering what part of the fracking process it comes into play.

It used for fracking.
It is used in the hydraulic fracturing process (known as "fracking") to produce petroleum fluids, such as oil, natural gas and natural gas liquids from rock units that lack adequate pore space for these fluids to flow to a well. Most frac sand is a natural material made from high-purity sandstone.

I guess I'm missing something...what, exactly, are they going to do with all this sand?

Fascinating! Thanks very much for the information!

Liquid CO2 is the next generation of fracking method, generated by existing power generation systems. Pumping the cryogenic fluid creates fracturing by temperature change, and much of the CO2 becomes a carbonate, being sequestered underground while leaving channels for upward flow of the oil.

Fracking water is only now reaching effective management, with recovery and reuse. Water that comes up with the oil is a remnant of ancient seas, and brings up minerals like lithium and cobalt, that can be concentrated out far cheaper than by mining. Recovered minerals promises to bring down the cost of batteries significantly once widespread use of the technology comes into play.

The shale oil fields, not long ago deemed impossible to exploit, are turning out continuing surprises.

Ellis Wyatt knew this many years ago. At that point the cost of oil was cheap enough that no one else bothered to extract oil in the way he did.