The Future Technology Challenge - Perfecting the Digital Wellbore
Authors: Daneshy Ali 
Published: February 2015

The healthy financial state of the oil and gas industry is causing a gradual and welcome change of focus from cost to improved recovery. After a quarter century of cost containment and technology downsizing, this change of direction will go a long way toward securing a healthier future for our industry. In fact, in the face of limited oil and gas resources, application of new technology is the only answer.

Manifestations of the change in direction are numerous and widespread. From horizontal holes with multiple fractures for production of tight gas in the Barnett Shale to intelligent downhole flow regulators in the South Shaybah oil field in Saudi Arabia, the industry is showing a renewed enthusiasm in its search for more production and higher overall recoveries. The success of these moves is bound to convince even the late adopters among us that technology is still a more powerful key to operational and reservoir management success than cost worries.

Another challenge facing the industry is a shortage of technically trained and competent manpower to explore, develop, and produce oil and gas from reservoirs located in remote and often harsh environments. Shortage of manpower mandates significantly more effective use of existing resources. This contradicts spending long traveling hours, or sitting at the wellsite waiting for something to happen. Besides, the next generation of technical people will be much less willing to spend time away from their families and much more dependent on immediate access to their computers and data sources. The complexity of problems often necessitates multiple technical skills and instant access to highly specialized computational capabilities. With the incredible advances in communication technology, people expect immediate answers. A new generation of operational systems needs to be developed to accommodate these expectations.

There have been numerous technical discussions regarding what the industry calls e-fields, i-fields, digital fields, or just intelligent fields. The scope of these projects is usually very broad and covers ambitious goals, including automatic, real-time, remotely controlled operations and intervention with minimal human involvement.

The next generation of technologies for higher recoveries will have to include better methods of enhancing the efficiency of drilling, completion, and production services performed in the wellbore, as well as tracking the movement of fluids within a producing reservoir. These will result in a substantial reduction of risk and associated waste, better execution of services, more-robust choices, and preparation of realistic and achievable plans and more effective and efficient utilization of all available resources. An option long considered attractive by experts is intelligent/digital wellbores. This is meant to include wellbores with sensors and data and power transmission capabilities that would allow monitoring and controlling operations within it, as well as surveying its surroundings. In essence, the wellbore is transformed into a complex plant in which its operations are monitored and controlled mechanically and electronically for integrity and efficiency. In this scenario, the wellbore becomes an important node in the intelligent field. Because the wellbore is our only gateway into the reservoir, the efficiency of its operations becomes our first step toward increasing the recovery of reservoir fluids.