Space Robotics Technologies for Deep Well Operations
Authors: Nayar Hari , Ali Khaled , Aubrey Andrew , Estlin Tara , Nesnas Issa , Parness Aaron , Hall Jeffery , Wiberg Dean V. 
Published: April 2012

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) routinely operates robotic spacecraftmillions of miles from the Earth. Current JPL missions include roving on Marsand observing the Sun, Earth, Saturn, comets and asteroids and deep space. Advances in high-fidelity modeling, simulation and visualization, high-precision sensors, instruments, harsh-environment electronics, autonomousoperations and on-board intelligence have enabled these challenging missions. Robotics capabilities developed at JPL have been applied to the MarsPathfinder, Mars Exploration Rover, Deep Space 1, EOS1 and other space missionsand used on many JPL research projects conducted for NASA, the US Department ofDefense and private industry. Although developed for space applications, thesetechnologies are also highly relevant to problems in terrestrial oil and gasexploration and production. Benefits from the deployment of these technologiesinclude greater precision, increased reliability, reduced uncertainty, increased productivity, reduced cost, and accelerated development schedules andtask completion times. In this paper, we provide a description of some of thesetechnologies and suggest how they might benefit the oil and gas industry

Introduction

JPL is a United States federally funded research and development center managedby the California Institute of Technology under a contract with NASA. Foundedmore than 50 years ago, JPL has been responsible for many pioneering spaceachievements including building and controlling Explorer 1 - the first USsatellite, the Ranger and Surveyor missions to land on the moon, Mariner 2 -the first spacecraft to Venus, the Viking missions to land on Mars, Voyager 1and 2 - the spacecraft that toured Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, theMars Pathfinder and Mars Exploration Rovers to drive on Mars and many others toobserve the planets, the sun, comets, and asteroids. In addition to itsplanetary exploration mission, JPL is actively involved in Earth science. Instruments and Earth-orbiting satellites developed at JPL study the geology, hydrology, ecology, oceanography, gravity and climate of the Earth. JPL alsoconducts missions focused beyond our solar system. Observations of deep spacehave yielded information about galaxy, star and planetary system formation, developed maps of our Milky Way galaxy and the universe, and found planets onother star systems. To enable these missions, JPL continues to developtechnologies in telecommunications, navigation, intelligent automation, imagingand image analyses, robotics, science instruments and micro- and nano-systems. In telecommunications, for example, JPL is able to collect data from theVoyager spacecraft beaming a 23 Watt signal from the edge of our solar systemmore than 14 billion kilometers away.

There are a number of similarities between space applications and applicationsin the oil & gas industry (Oxnevad, 2010). In both cases, systems aredeployed at remote locations with limited access for intervention, maintenanceor repair. The operational environments are often hostile with harshtemperatures and pressures and corrosive materials. Reliability of systems isextremely important in space and in the oil and gas industry. Operations in therespective environments have high risk and the capabilities for replicatingenvironmental conditions for testing and failure mitigation are limited. Failures can be catastrophic and the cost, financially and in publicperception, can erode support for programs. Due to these similarities, there ismuch that the space and energy sectors can learn and benefit from eachother.