Supercritical carbon dioxide (SC-CO₂) fracturing is a non-aqueous fracturing technology, which has attracted considerable attention on exploiting shale gas. In this study, shale specimens and artificial sandstone specimens were used to conduct SC-CO₂ fracturing and water fracturing experiments to investigate the characteristics of SC-CO₂ induced fractures. An acoustic emission (AE) monitoring device was employed to monitor the AE energy release rate during the experiment. The experiment results indicate that the breakdown pressure of SC-CO₂ fracturing is lower than that of water fracturing under the same conditions, and the AE energy release rate of SC-CO₂ fracturing is 1–2 orders of magnitude higher than that of water fracturing. In artificial sandstone, which is homogeneous, the main fracture mainly propagates along the directions perpendicular to the minimum principal stress, no matter if using SC-CO₂ or water as the fracturing fluid, but in shale with weak structural planes, the propagation direction of the fracture is controlled by the combined effect of a weak structural plane and in-situ stress.

The initiation and propagation behavior of fractures induced by supercritical carbon dioxide (SC-CO₂) jet fracturing is significant to evaluate stimulated reservoir volume (SRV). However, the propagation characteristics of fractures induced by SC-CO₂ jet in layered rocks with layers having different mechanical properties have not yet been studied. In this study, four groups of artificial sandstones were used to conduct SC-CO₂ jet fracturing experiments and investigate the fracture initiation and propagation behavior in hard and soft layered rocks. A strain collection device was employed to monitor the strain changes of the specimens during the experiments, and after the experiments, a three-dimensional scanner was used to obtain the morphologies of the main fractures. Experimental results showed that the SC-CO₂ jet fracturing can be divided into the pressurization of the perforation pressure stage and fracture propagation stage, and the fractures initiation and propagation is intermittent. Three types of main fractures have been found—longitudinal fracture, transverse fracture and oblique fracture—and the formation mechanism of the main fractures has been elaborated. The rock strength can affect the number and complexity of fractures created and the fracturing rate, and the Young’s modulus of rock has an effect on fracture propagation length. The fractures mainly develop near the perforation and are difficult to propagate to another layer with different mechanical properties. The result in our study is conducive to the application of SC-CO₂ jet fracturing technology in the field.