Use of Along-String Measurements and High-Speed Telemetry for Geohazard Mitigation and Improved Risk Management Delivers Enhanced Operational Efficiency and Enables Optimal Well Placement in Challenging Offshore and Onshore Applications
Authors: Stephen Pink , Dale Bradley , Johnathan Rice , Vasily Eliseev 
Published: August 2024

Objectives / Scope

Wired pipe (high-speed telemetry), along-string measurements, and advanced logging while drilling (LWD) tools have been deployed in multiple wells worldwide over the last 10+ years to address specific challenges operators face. These challenges typically have been either insurmountable with other methods or using alternative techniques and technologies has delivered suboptimal results. This paper will discuss unique use cases from the North Sea and offshore California, where high-fidelity pressure and dynamics measurements, combined with high-speed telemetry, were used to address complex geotechnical challenges such as low overburden, shale reactivity, and Karstified reservoirs. Further examples will highlight how improved downhole data quality and greater bandwidth can improve wellbore placement to enhance overall well productivity and operational efficiency.

Methods, Procedures, Process

Operators today are targeting more complex reservoirs to deliver required hydrocarbon production, necessitating modified and challenging well designs with unique geotechnical and geological challenges. To deliver these well designs, operators require optimal well placement geometrically and geologically with excellent tortuosity management. At the same time, operators must manage associated risks such as wellbore stability, hole cleaning, and geological uncertainty. Leveraging wired pipe and allied technologies has delivered data and downhole intelligence at a volume and fidelity otherwise unachievable with legacy technology. This significant improvement in data availability has allowed modified workflows and real-time decision-making, enabling innovative approaches to address well challenges.

Results, Observations, Conclusions

In the case studies discussed in this paper, all cases achieved successful outcomes, but not without challenges. These successes include the delivery of extended-reach drilling (ERD) wells with a greater than 6:1 ratio at less than 1,000 ft true vertical depth (TVD) while injecting nitrogen. Also, first oil was delivered months ahead of schedule by innovatively combatting historically problematic shales, amongst other innovations on the Norwegian Shelf, to drill multiple wells successfully with exemplary well placement. Key to the success of all the cases has been the right data at the right time to make decisions in real time in relation to the trajectory, wellbore health, etc., while positively impacting operational efficiency.

Novel, Additive Information

Traditional telemetry methods such as mud pulse have created a downhole data bottleneck, preventing access to all the relevant data when required, thereby reducing the ability to deliver the perfect or near-perfect well. Integration of wired pipe and along-string measurements with essentially unlimited LWD capacity via a downhole broadband connection has allowed innovative approaches to wellbore stability management and overburden, loss management, critical well placement decisions, and operational efficiency. The outcomes, in some cases, have been potentially industry-changing.