Patent Document ID: 7599797
Application ID: 11350655
Patent Status: 1

Claim One:
1. A method of mitigating risk of subsurface well collision, comprising: obtaining a survey of a field wherein a subject well is to be drilled; running an anti-collision scan while planning or drilling the subject well to determine if a requirement to be fulfilled in the process of drilling the subject well is violated, the requirement being based on the field survey to avoid collision between the subject well and offset wells in the field; generating an anti-collision report indicating if and where along the subject well the requirement to be fulfilled in the process of drilling the subject well is violated; generating a request for an exemption to the requirement that is violated, the request indicating a severity of the risk of collision between the subject well and an offset well from minor to major risk; assessing the exemption request using a three-dimensional matrix, the dimensions including parameters comprising a center-to-center distance, a separation factor, a surface rule, a mud weight, a hydrostatic pressure, a collision depth, a reservoir pressure, a magnetic scan, a survey program, or a completion type; deriving a cell within the matrix during assessment of the exemption request based on values for the parameters of the matrix dimensions for the subject well included in the exemption request; and generating a visual display of the exemption request assessment results to determine if action is required to manage the likelihood of an event controlling a risk of collision or to reduce or eliminate the potential risk of collision between the subject well and an offset well based on a set of actions in the derived matrix cell.