True Rig Automation Stymied by Lack of Interoperable Drilling Tools, but Industry Study Offers a Way Forward
Authors: Jacobs Trent 
Published: June 2024

A recent industry study argues that despite 2 decades of progress, the oil and gas industry’s drive toward drilling automation is staring at a bottleneck that threatens to stifle future innovation.

Authored by professionals from the Drilling and Wells Interoperability Standards (D-WIS) work group, IADC/SPE 217748 puts the spotlight on systems interoperability—or rather, the lack of it.

The paper brings together expertise from big players such as Noble Drilling, Hess Corp., and Baker Hughes, among others. The group was formed in 2020 under the SPE Drilling Systems Automation Technical Section (DSATS) and its recommendations reflect the input of more than five dozen entities, including most of the supermajors, the big four service companies, the world’s largest drilling contractors, and several smaller technology and research groups.

D-WIS points out that the automation tech we’ve seen hit the market so far has been limited to distinct components and segments of the well-construction process. Notable advancements include automation offerings for pipe handling, rotary steerable systems, and rate of penetration.

Such innovations have taken people out of harm’s way, lowered drilling costs, and helped make better wellbores. However, they are standalone, isolated applications that generally do not interact with each other unless they are owned by the same company.

According to the new D-WIS study, reaching the next level of drilling efficiency through a truly automated system requires data to be shared seamlessly between different rig technologies regardless of the manufacturer.

The workgroup’s authors assert that not only have the low-hanging fruits been largely picked when it comes to making major gains in well construction but that “the current siloed approach has begun to reach its limits and is consuming capital and resources.”

Reasons why interoperability on the rig doesn’t already exist range from concerns over the exposure of proprietary information to third parties, to a lack of incentives for equipment makers and service providers to oblige. There’s also the age-old tradition of resisting change.

D-WIS is making the case that working past these obstacles will clear the way for a new generation of advisory and drilling process software to be deployed at unprecedented speed and scale. The linchpin for this progress is a common interface standard that will transform disparate technologies into easily integrable plug-and-play components.

To achieve its ambitious goal the industry group has outlined a dual-path strategy that tackles both the technical requirements and commercial risks.

In the near term, the group is encouraging companies to adopt ISA-88, an industrial control standard already relied upon by many heavy industries. An additional step calls for the development of an Application Programming Interface (API) that facilitates communication between automated drilling control systems (ADCS) and external advisory software.

For the long term, the strategy includes drafting a contract addendum to clearly define the risk responsibilities for all parties involved along with the establishment of a dedicated organization to create and oversee the standards.

To expand on these issues and discuss the aims of D-WIS, the study’s authors provide additional perspective in this Q&A.