Perth Basin oil producer Triangle Energy, on behalf of the Cliff Head Joint Venture, has announced that the CH-6 well at the Cliff Head Oil Field returned to production on 23 August, following the completion of the workover programme.
The workover included the installation of a new ESP in a more technically and cost effective configuration than previously adopted. All of the technical and well integrity expectations of the programme were met, and the well was handed over from well services to production on 22 August.
Performance testing and verification is currently underway, and the company expects that production associated with the CH-6 well is expected to stabilise at around 120 bopd, bringing the total field production to approximately 850 bopd.
The company’s Hydraulic Workover Unit provider, Clear Cut Interventions (CCI), with the assistance of R&D Solutions, successfully deployed the first Omega Gemini plug on Slickline using a time delay hydrostatic setting tool in an offshore environment in Asia Pacific. Omega provided virtual training to the CCI supervisor due to COVID travel restrictions preventing a specialist being deployed to Australia.
The joint CH-6 and CH-11WI workover campaign provided the company with the rare opportunity to evaluate the condition of the downhole completion and wellbore equipment with regards to long term well integrity and corrosion management.
Robert Towner, Managing Director, Triangle Energy said, “Well integrity management is a priority at Cliff Head, and the condition of the recovered equipment from both the CH-6 and CH-11WI wells showed no visible evidence of corrosion or physical degradation.
“This is an excellent outcome considering the years since this equipment was installed, and supports our plans to continue to extend the operating life of the facility. The company looks forward to future well activities and exploring asset life extension opportunities.”
Triangle Energy (Global) Ltd is an ASX-listed oil producer and explorer based in Perth, Western Australia. The company operates and has a 78.75% interest in the Cliff Head Oil Field,
encompassing the onshore Arrowsmith Stabilisation Plant and offshore Cliff Head Alpha Platform. Triangle also has a 50% share of the Mt Horner L7 production licence and a 45% share of the Xanadu-1 Joint Venture, both located in the Perth Basin. The company continues to assess acquisition prospects to expand its portfolio of assets.
Aberdeen-based downhole sensing technology specialist, Well-SENSE, has entered into a five-year agreement that provides Halliburton Company exclusive rights to distribute and deploy Well-SENSE’s FiberLine Intervention (FLI) technology in North America’s unconventional wells market.
Understanding and optimising well and fracture interactions is a challenge that operators face today. Branded by Halliburton as ExpressFiber, the disposable fibre-optic surveying solution offers operators in North America’s unconventional market an accurate and direct subsurface measurement during fracture operations, at a price point to suit every well pad. Unlike other cross-well monitoring techniques that provide indirect measurements, ExpressFiber uses distributed acoustic sensing (DAS) to acquire a direct measurement of microseismic, strain and temperature.
Annabel Green, CEO of Well-SENSE, said, “Entering into our first, multi-year, commercial contract with a leading oil and gas service company is an exciting step for Well-SENSE and it will demonstrate the scalability of FLI. Our unique bare fibre deployment technology delivers cost and time savings alongside superior data and has a wide range of downhole applications. We are firmly focused on delivering that value to operators around the world and our agreement with Halliburton represents a key milestone in this strategy.”
Well-SENSE’s wider range of acoustic and thermal fibre solutions have been successfully deployed, both onshore and offshore, around the world for a variety of applications. Currently the technology is in high demand to assist with cement assurance, leak detection, P&A planning, cross-well strain and vertical seismic surveys.
Well-SENSE is part of Aberdeen’s FrontRow Energy Technology Group, which is focused on nurturing new technology to provide practical solutions to current oil and gas challenges.
Expro Group Holdings International Limited (Expro) has reported its financial and operational results for the three and six months ended June 30, 2021 with total revenue for Q2 2021 standing at US$176.3mn, compared to revenue of US$156.3mn in Q1 2021, an increase of 13% sequentially.
The company’s net loss for Q2 2021 was US$8.4mn compared to a net loss of US$20.4mn for Q1 2021. Adjusted EBITDA of US$26.3mn increased 58% sequentially, driven by higher revenue, a more favourable activity mix and lower corporate costs.
Mike Jardon, CEO of Expro, commented, “Expro delivered solid performance in the second quarter as our broad portfolio of services, global operating footprint and continued cost and capital discipline enabled us to effectively manage and mitigate ongoing industry headwinds related to the pandemic.”
Intervention leads the way
Jardon continued, “Thanks to the hard work, expertise and commitment of our talented employees, as well as our leading technology platform, we continued to advance our capabilities and deliver differentiated services and solutions that safely enhance our customers’ operational efficiency and improve the sustainability of both Expro’s and our customers’ operations.
“For example, Expro employed its unique CoilHose intervention system to initiate production by unloading heavy completions fluids from a highly deviated well in Asia. This solution successfully delivered both time and cost efficiencies to the client. Additionally, the compact system footprint and associated ease of logistics resulted in a significant improvement in the environmental impact of the operations as compared with traditional solutions.”
“Also during the second quarter, we achieved an industry first by deploying our unique Octopoda annulus intervention system to a depth of 300 metres in the C annulus of a well in Latin America. This system successfully introduced a plug in the annulus which restored casing integrity and enabled production to be safely resumed from the well. We are very excited about the potential of Octopoda as it will allow customers to, cost effectively restore well integrity, resume production and reduce fugitive gas emissions from wells,” Jardon added.
“In recent years, the majority of Expro’s business has been driven by our customers’ production optimisation efforts and their operational expenditures more so than their drilling-related activities and capital expenditures. As a result (and despite the possibility of continuing headwinds related to the pandemic), we currently expect at least modest revenue and margin momentum for Expro over the next couple of quarters, driven by an overall increase in international activity, and positive trends in well testing and production services and well intervention and integrity services, in particular. Beyond the next couple of quarters, an expected recovery in offshore development across geographies reinforces our confidence that Expro is well-positioned for sustained growth, which we believe will be driven by increasing demand for subsea well access services and more complex well construction services, respective strengths of Expro and Frank’s International with whom we announced a definitive merger agreement on March 11, 2021.”
Regional breakdown
The company report noted that their operations in Asia Paciifc were particularly strong primary driven by higher subsea, completion and intervention services revenue in Brunei and Australia. In Brunei, Expro is in the start-up phase of a multi-year well intervention campaign, while in Australia, results benefitted from a generally higher level of customer activity and higher well testing services revenue.
Revenue in MENA was driven by higher subsea, completion and intervention services in Qatar and Algeria. The year-over-year decrease in MENA revenue was primarily driven by lower well testing services revenue in Algeria and Egypt as a result of lower activity levels, partially offset by increase in subsea, completion and intervention services revenue from a new project in Qatar.
In North and Latin America revenue sequential improvement in was primarily driven by higher subsea, completion and intervention services revenue in Argentina, reflecting a strong recovery in activity following Covid-19 related project delays in 2020, and higher well testing services revenue in Mexico and the Gulf of Mexico, which were largely offset by lower subsea, completion and intervention services revenue in the Gulf of Mexico from lower customer activity. The year-over-year improvement in segment revenue was primarily driven by higher well testing revenues in Mexico, higher subsea, completion and intervention services revenue in Argentina and Columbia.
READ Cased Hole, a leading provider of cased hole logging services and technologies to the global oil and gas industry, has appointed Kevin Giles as its new Managing Director.
Giles has worked within the well intervention market for more than 30 years and, prior to joining READ, he spent six years at Welltec in senior management positions. Before that, he worked with Schlumberger’s electric wireline business for 20 years, progressing from offshore-based operations to key client account management and then to leadership of its UK cased hole wireline business.
The new Managing Director has now been at READ for some time, having spent the last three years as global commercial director for the company. In his new role, he will be responsible for the day-to-day management of the READ business worldwide. This includes all activities at its hub facilities in Aberdeen, Doha, Houston and Anchorage where the company supports its valued customers including oil and gas operators, major service companies, and specialist business partners.
Emerging from uncertainty
Giles said, “This is a significant time for our industry, and I am delighted to be stepping up to lead the READ business as we start to emerge from a long period of uncertainty and disruption. It’s never been more important for us to support new and existing customers and business partners looking for robust cased hole logging expertise. As an organisation, we will be wholly focused on delivering READ’s exemplary standards of safety, service quality, technical excellence and customer care.”
Tor Erling Gunnerød, Norvestor Equity Partner and Chairman of READ, added, “Kevin’s knowledge of the global cased hole logging market, the technologies involved, and the needs of oil and gas operators is second to none. I have every confidence that Kevin will continue successfully growing READ’s international reach, customer base and service portfolio, and look forward to seeing the company emerge even stronger under his leadership.”
KDS JV AS, the joint venture between DOF Subsea and Aker Solutions, has been awarded a subsea decommissioning contract for DNO at the Norwegian Continental Shelf.
The contract includes engineering, preparation, removal & disposal work (EPRD) of associated subsea hardware.
The project shall be delivered by an integrated expert team from the JV partners. DOF Subsea shall deploy Skandi Acergy from its fleet, and Aker Solutions will use its disposal site at Stord for recycling.
Engineering will start immediately, with offshore execution planned for the first quarter of 2022, although there is a possibility for an earlier start in the last quarter of 2021.
Included in the project scope is the removal and disposal of subsea infrastructure such as template, manifold, production spools, umbilical, covers and associated hardware.
Netherlands-based Wintershall Noordzee B.V., a joint venture of Wintershall Dea GmbH and Gazprom EP International B.V., has started a largescale decommissioning programme in the Southern North Sea.
The first phase of this programme will last for approximately one and a half years and entails the plugging-and-abandonment (P&A) of 24 wells in both Dutch and German waters, and the removal of two platforms and two subsea installations.
The tender for the first part of this extensive programme was granted to Swift Drilling BV. In the past months, the SWIFT 10 jack-up rig has been modified and prepared to start work after a period of stacking due to a worldwide economic slump in offshore activities. The rig will first set sail to the P9 location to close off and safely abandon two subsea wells. It will then continue to the next wells until all 24 wells have been securely plugged and abandoned.
Decommissioning and complete removal of its assets is part of the full activity cycle of Wintershall Noordzee. A largescale campaign such as this is an efficient and effective way for the company to fulfill its decommissioning liabilities, Windershall Noordzee says.
“It is merely the final act of what we do, and one we have mastered doing over the years”, said Jone Hess, Managing Director of Wintershall Noordzee B.V. “We are proud of our accomplishments in the Southern North Sea and will continue to fulfill our obligations when it comes to our assets.”
Removal of four non-producing assets
Part of the largescale decommissioning programme is the full removal of the Q4-A and B production platforms, in addition to the two P9 subsea installations. These activities are due to start in the spring of 2022, with completion by Q4 2022.
Wintershall Noordzee B.V. is one of the largest producers of natural gas on the Dutch continental shelf. It is operator of 23 production platforms and six subsea installations in the Dutch, English, German, and Danish sectors of the North Sea. Active in the Southern North Sea since 1965, the company has substantial experience in decommissioning and re-use of its installations. Since the late 1980s, 58 wells have successfully been plugged and abandoned, starting with the first five wells in 1988 belonging to production platform K13-D. That same year, the topside of K13-D was moved to its new location in sector L8 becoming production platform L8-H. This marked the company’s first of a total of seven reused topsides to date.
Wintershall Noordzee has fully decommissioned and removed 16 production platforms during the past 30+ years, of which seven topsides were reused at new locations in the Southern North Sea. The topside of production platform P14-A has already been recycled twice by becoming the topside of E18-A in 2008, which became the topside of production platform D12-B in 2019.
Logan Industries (Logan), a hydraulic repair, manufacturing and rental company, has completed the design, fabrication and delivery of a set of unique safety cages to keep offshore technicians safe while inspecting subsea connectors on BOP stacks while on deck.
Logan engineered and manufactured the safety cage in its Hempstead, Texas, facility.
The safety cage is designed to protect the safety of technicians working near the BOP, in the rare event that the load should accidentally drop. The safety cage is designed to absorb and stop a falling load of up to 450,000 lbs.
Logan’s engineering team used their expertise in basic physics and engineering principles to come in with a solution that makes the customer’s operation more efficient and safer.
Dean Carey, Technical Director, Logan Industries, said, “We have worked for this customer in various capacities over the last 19 years and our partnership demonstrates the ongoing trust that our customers place in our industry experience, operational knowledge, and ingenuity to design and engineer solutions for unique projects.”
C-Innovation, LLC (C-I), an affiliate of Edison Chouest Offshore (ECO) and its family of companies, has been awarded a multi-year contract for Riserless Light Well Intervention (RLWI) services with a major operator in the Gulf of Mexico.
The contract is for the provision of RLWI services onboard the M/V Island Venture, C-I’s flagship intervention vessel commissioned in 2017. The 160 m, DP3 vessel is ideally suited to perform deepwater riserless interventions in the Gulf of Mexico. It is expected to perform intervention activities on eight to ten wells per year, including wireline and stimulations.
C-I’s Vice-President David Sheetz said, “This new contract is a direct result of our accomplishments with the same operator over the last two years. I am extremely proud of our teams and partnerships with both Halliburton and Baker Hughes to deliver the kind of success that allows us to continue to be the leaders with our Single Source Solution for deepwater RLWI in the Gulf of Mexico.”
“These are exciting times for our industry,” commented Dino Chouest, President of C-I, “and the forward thinking and innovative ideas our teams have developed over the last two years are setting new standards in deepwater riserless well interventions. We look forward to expanding our offerings with additional vessels and advanced solutions in the near future.”
Aberdeen-based Well-Safe Solutions, which specialises in the decommissioning of onshore and offshore wells, is gearing up to take advantage of the expected increase in activity in 2021/2022.
In the company’s Group Strategic Report and Directors’ Report for the year ended 31 March 2020, issued in July 2021, CEO Phil Milton commented that the improving COVID-19 situation, improving oil prices and steps taken by the company to reduce capex and opex mean that it will be well positioned to commence decommissioning operations in 2021/2022 as contracts are awarded.
Milton commented that the size of the market has not been affected by the downturn in activity, with the commencement of work being deferred rather than cancelled, although he noted that there remains some uncertainty about the speed and timing of contract awards.
“The business remains focused on fulfilling current agreed work, and is in active discussion with other third parties regarding new and future contracts,” he said.
“The focus for the year ahead is in managing costs while working through the downturn in activity as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and oil price crash.
“We continue to plan for the restart of the well decommissioning programme suspended due to the COVID-19 outbreak, where four wells were mechanically suspended and still required to be fully decommissioned.” He added that the offshore decommissioning programme restarted in May 2021.
According to the Directors’ Report, the group had in excess of £12mn (US$16.7mn) in cash reserves at the end of June 2021 to support the final pieces of refurbishment works required on its fleet, converting the rigs to bespoke plugging and abandonment (P&A) units in readiness for an increase in activity.
Well-Safe Solutions was established in 2017 to provide a ground-breaking approach to safe and cost-efficient decommissioning. It continues to develop its innovative P&A Club whereby members provide a pool of wells that enable Well-Safe Solutions to leverage economies of scale to reduce decommissioning costs for all members. The company is engaged in research and development activities with the aim of enhancing industry knowledge and understanding of key technologies and processes which can deliver costs and efficiency improvements to clients’ decommissioning projects.
With the industry’s drilling units (both semi-submersible and jack-ups) in the UKCS in decline through retirement and cold stacking, Well-Safe is bucking the trend by investing heavily in its fleet. The company added a second rig to its fleet of bespoke decommissioning assets in September 2020, the Well-Safe Protector. Following this acquisition, it secured a £26mn (US$36.1mn) investment to fund the next stage in its growth plan and deliver its vision to become a globally recognised Tier 1 well decommissioning company, with the ability to cover both subsea wells and multiple platform projects. Well-Safe Solutions is looking to add further assets to its growing fleet.
EnerMech, a global services company specialising in critical asset support across the asset lifecycle from pre-commissioning to decommissioning, has appointed Daniel McCarthy as its strategic proposals director to help accelerate its planned growth across the business.
In McCarthy’s 18-year career in oil and gas, he has won high-value projects in North and South America, the Caribbean, Europe and the Middle East, and managed and developed multi-discipline tender teams to ensure proposals meet all health, safety and quality requirements.
Based in the United Kingdom, McCarthy will be instrumental in building on recent successes with a key focus on devising and implementing best-in-class procedures for cross-regional, complex proposals. His focus on large-scale tenders will also see Mr McCarthy align the company’s technical expertise across its global locations to deliver proposals across the energy and infrastructure sectors.
McCarthy commented, “EnerMech is a forward-thinking company with vision, energy and purpose, and I am very excited to be joining the business and supporting its next stage of international growth. When bidding for new business across multiple countries and sectors, there is a myriad of different requirements, nuances and complexities involved in the tendering process. The team at EnerMech are incredibly experienced in addressing these challenges and have won a significant number of important and large-scale contracts as a result, despite the recent downturn and coronavirus pandemic.”
Behzad Kazerani, Chief Business Development Officer at EnerMech, added, “Daniel’s appointment underlines the company’s commitment to building a world-class senior team to support our overarching global ambitions.
“We have added a number of key contract wins to our books since the start of the year including a five-year contract with Chevron in Australia. And, as awareness has increased of our extensive capabilities and in-house resources to support this scale of opportunity, we are submitting a growing number of new, exciting large scope tenders from new clients in new territories. Daniel’s insight will help to advance our teams and their ability to deliver proposals that strike the right chord.”
The business has experienced a strong performance in 2021 and secured contracts totalling UK£170mn in the first quarter of the year including substantial downstream projects in Africa and the US as well as a second award for its unique patented catalyst handling technology.
TechnipFMC has announced its intention to acquire the remaining 49% of shares in TIOS AS, a joint venture between TechnipFMC and Island Offshore Management AS (Island Offshore) formed in 2018.
TIOS provides fully integrated Riserless Light Well Intervention (RLWI) services, including project management and engineering for plug and abandonment, riserless coiled tubing and well completion and intervention operations, and has serviced more than 740 wells globally since 2005.
The acquisition will accelerate the development of TechnipFMC’s integrated service model focused on maximising value to its clients.
The company will continue to utilise Island Offshore as the vessel provider for RLWI services.
Jonathan Landes, President, Subsea at TechnipFMC, said, “We are pleased to welcome TIOS wholly into TechnipFMC. This transaction brings into the company additional expertise that will maximise our capability to provide a complete range of well services globally to our clients in a rapid and economical manner.”
This announcement comes soon after the company released its Q2 2021 results, in which its subsea performance was particularly strong.
Doug Pferdehirt, Chairman and CEO of TechnipFMC, commented, “Subsea inbound orders of US$2.8bn in the first half of the year were strong. We continue to see a healthy list of prospects and remain very confident in our full-year guidance for Subsea orders of more than US$4bn. Furthermore, growth in 2022 is supported by an increasing set of opportunities.
“We believe that offshore will continue to play a meaningful role in the total energy mix. We are building partnerships in support of new energy, leveraging our differentiated technologies, and capitalising on our integrated project execution and expertise as the subsea architect.”
Halliburton has launched ExpressFiber, a single-use fibre optic cable that offers accurate, direct subsurface measurements, including cross-well communication, at a price point that enables fracture monitoring on every well pad.
Understanding and optimising well and fracture interference is a significant challenge that operators face today. ExpressFiber uses distributed acoustic sensing (DAS) to acquire a direct measurement of micro seismic, strain, and temperature unlike other cross-well monitoring techniques that provide indirect estimates.
ExpressFiber, paired with Halliburton’s intelligent fracturing and subsurface monitoring services, provides real-time actionable insights of fracture growth and well interference, allowing operators to improve completions designs and gain overall capital efficiency. It can be pumped downhole in offset wells within a couple of hours, and can be installed any time before or during the fracturing operation. ExpressFiber is designed to withstand downhole conditions for the duration of the stimulation treatment before degrading, and has no impact to subsequent fracturing operations in offset wellbores.
Michael Segura, Vice-President of Production Enhancement, commented, “When it comes to direct measurement of the subsurface, fibre is the most direct and trusted sensor of choice, but traditionally it has been expensive and complex to install. Our innovative fibre portfolio transforms fracture monitoring from an application reserved for science wells to a routine solution for regular use on more wells across your asset.”
Through a five-year agreement for North America unconventionals, ExpressFiber will be enabled by FiberLine Intervention (FLI), a wellbore surveying technique from Well-SENSE Technology Limited.
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