West Africa

Attendees of Offshore Well Intervention West Africa 2022 (OWI WA) will be treated to no less than four presentations from Shell when the conference arrives in Accra from 12-13 July.

Up first for the international supermajor is Segun Lanade, Logistics Supervisor for Shell Nigeria, who will present on the topic of local sourcing. Lanade will explain the impact sourcing equipment has on the local economy, as well as the implications it has on intervention projects, before exploring the influence local authorities can have on encouraging this practice and how this can affect intervention activity in the region.

Following this, Benjamin Ajaraogu, Well Integrity Adivisor, LI: Well Integrity SME & Production Technology TA2 at Shell Nigeria, will concentrate on brownfield wells management by showcasing Shell’s approach for acquiring best in class well integrity technologies to keep ageing wells productive. He will also touch upon approaches towards plug and abandonment (P&A) with a focus on effectiveness and safety.

Looking at deepwater well intervention in West Africa, Chiwuike Amaechi, Subsea Systems & Intervention Engineer at Shell, will provide detail on the current regulations and standards as well as how to navigate them in order to ultimately increase the volume of well intervention in West Africa. Light well intervention has been touted as efficient and cost-effective solution which could help to solve sub-Saharan Africa’s rapidly ageing offshore assets and, in light of this, Amaechi will help participants discover the trail blazing technology, tool and services that have been used in the region to help enhance future deepwater well intervention campaigns.

Last but by no means least, Ajaraogu will return to the stage to discuss utilising digitalisation for risk management. In the session, he will explain how technologies can assist in well monitoring to allow for full visibility; demonstrate how to identify potential risk factors before they occur; and, through his expertise and impressive experience, provide participants with the knowledge to increase their chance of protecting wells from integrity failures in order to maximise protection.

These exclusive presentations will be accessible at OWI WA along with a unique opportunity to network with a wide range of industry professionals and experts. To learn more, be sure to download the event brochure here:
https://www.offsnet.com/owi-wa/conference-brochure

Or reach out to the details below:

Rachael Brand
Project Manager
T: +44 (0) 20 3409 3041
e: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

EnerMech, a global services company specialising in critical asset support across the asset lifecycle, has hired Carl Mook as the Regional Director for Europe and expanded Paul Cockerill’s role to oversee Africa, in addition to his current Middle East and Caspian remit.

The new senior structure will help drive further growth for the firm’s Europe and Africa operations. The business will leverage both leaders’ expertise to span responsibilities focusing on the two continents, as well as scaling up teams when required in the Middle East and Caspian region.

Mook has 30 years of international leadership experience in engineering consultancy and design, asset management, operations and maintenance, inspection services technology and asset integrity. He has held several senior roles in his career, including Executive Vice President at Penspen and Vice President of Process and Pipeline Services at Baker Hughes.

Cockerill has been EnerMech’s Regional Director Middle East and Caspian for almost two years and has been pivotal in the business securing several transformational projects and pre-commissioning campaigns in the region. He has significant experience in Africa, having previously held senior positions at Halliburton in Angola, Congo and Nigeria for 16 years where he was instrumental in increasing market share and developing local workforces.

EnerMech CEO Christian Brown remarked, “The Europe and Africa region has been delivering a solid performance for the business, which is a direct result of our teams in these geographies delivering excellence day in, day out. However, we are not a company to rest on its laurels.

“Paul has delivered exceptional results in the Middle East and Caspian. Widening his portfolio to support our Africa operations, means we can rapidly scale up our teams as more campaigns and megaprojects are won. The wealth of experience and enthusiasm Carl brings to the business will help us to further develop our European operations with a pin-sharp focus on securing new business as well as overseeing existing project work.”

Baker Hughes has announced that it will be acquiring Altus Intervention, a leading international provider of well intervention services and down-hole oil and gas technology, to complement its existing portfolio of oilfield technologies and integrated solutions.

Altus Intervention employs around 1200 people globally and operates across four regions: UK and West Africa; Norway and Denmark; Americas; and Middle East and Asia Pacific.

“The addition of Altus Intervention supports our strategy to transform core oil & gas operations by enhancing technological capabilities and providing customers with higher-efficiency solutions,” commented Maria Claudia Borras, Executive Vice President of Oilfield Services at Baker Hughes. “We value the Altus Intervention team’s deep expertise and look forward to bringing these fully integrated well intervention solutions to our global customer base.”

Åge Landro, CEO of Altus Intervention, added, “Our technology and techniques play a critical role in improving production, well intervention and plug and abandonment, and we believe this agreement with Baker Hughes is the right step forward.

“We are focused on a long-standing vision of making intervention smarter to deliver real change operationally and commercially, and we look forward to leveraging Baker Hughes’ strong network, complementary technology and global infrastructure in the oil and gas industry.”

The transaction is expected to close in the second half of 2022. The acquisition agreement includes all intellectual property, personnel and commercial agreements.

Senergy Wells, a Vysus Group company, has secured 15 new contract wins in wells disciplines globally, stretching from Mexico, through Europe and Africa to southeast Asia.

The contracts, worth more than UK£5mn to the company, include a range of projects with numerous customers, including Energean, Repsol, Shell, Chevron, TAQA and Harbour Energy UK.

To support the breadth of international projects secured, Senergy Wells has embarked upon a recruitment drive to bolster its expertise across services from exploration to decommissioning.

Matt Rothnie, SVP Senergy Wells & ModuSpec, commented, “We are naturally delighted to have secured such a wide range of contracts to deliver projects across the world for a range of customers from energy independents to super majors and NOCs. It’s also encouraging that the type of work covers the complete spectrum of the asset lifecycle from wildcat exploration and front end engineering, through field development, well construction and design, and ultimate decommissioning.

“This positive start to 2022 comes as we bring back the Senergy name. Vysus Group is extremely proud of its heritage and the legacy companies which give us our unique breadth of deep domain expertise. Our experience in the well engineering, operations and project management sector originated within Senergy – and this is a name still instantly recognisable by many in our industry as a service provider and trusted partner for well operators. It’s not just what we do but importantly how we do it, how we show up for our customers. That is why we’re bringing it back.

“The calibre of projects we are supporting this year is fantastic and testament to the proven technical delivery of our team. We look forward to continuing to help our global customer base deliver efficient operations throughout 2022 and beyond.”

Tendeka offers its portfolio of innovative tools and technologies in sub-Saharan Africa to restore production from existing well stocks, reduce gas and water flow and improve production.

The versatile suite of solutions does not require complex interventions and has already brought huge logistical, technical and financial savings to operators in the region.

Intelligent technology

PulseEight dynamic downhole reservoir management system is the world’s first re-deployable wireless completion range. Utilising Fluid Harmonics telemetry, two-way communications to and from a suite of downhole tools can be used to optimise production:

• PulseEight Electronic Ambient Valve (EAV) reinstates wells which were previously closed through loss/lack of a safety valve
• PulseEight Wireless Gauges (WG) provides pressure and temperature data from wells which have lost permanent systems or where these were never installed
• PulseEight Intelligent Valve (ICV) delivers infinite, inline manipulation of flow for choking and shut-off purposes

In addition to PulseEight, the company’s Mature Fields offering includes retrofittable, next generation inflow control technology, to attain a uniform inflow profile for enhanced oil production in new wells or through intervention.

Tendeka also offers in-house capability to custom design a range of sealing solutions, from non-standard diameters to unique fluid parameters, ensuring a perfect fit for well projects.

These include SwellStack sealing solutions which are rated to 15,000 psi in gas, reinstating the function of safety valves quickly and effectively; Swellable O-rings to reinstate the function of safety valves quickly and effectively; and SwellRight Side Pocket Mandrel (SPM) Plugs to provide pressure integrity in damaged side pocket mandrel bores.

Following success in Chad to solve sand production issues in water injection wells, Tendeka is working with a local partner in Nigeria to deliver Casacde3 in a multi-well subsea development.

Environment Quality Services (EQS) has successfully assisted in a decommissioning project offshore Angola. Dubai-based EQS deployed their Saab Seaeye Falcon to assess the integrity of the offshore structures via visual inspection and image gathering.

Carlos Rodrigues, CTO, of EQS, commented, The Falcon supports EQS in their aim to fulfil specific works in a safe and cost-effective manner by delivering accurate and relevant information.”

Rodrigues said that the Falcon is an ideal resource for specialist work as it can handle an array of cameras, sensors, tooling and complex data gathering systems that can easily be added or changed thanks to the Falcon iCON intelligent module- focused distributed control architecture.

The Falcon is the top selling robot of its class and its success is attributed to it being a portable, metre-sized, intelligent, powerful highly mahneuverable, easy-to-use vehicle with a depth rated range to 1,000 metres.

It has a reliability record covering more than one million hours underwater, including deep tunnel work. The Falcon can remain stable in turbulent waters and strong currents whilst undertaking both robust and precision tasks.

The structures inspected on the platform offshore Angola included the platform (jacket), well head, protection dome, pipelines and umbilical. EQS helped the offshore energy clients navigate the complex environmental regulatory landscape to achieve compliance as well.

Presenting at the Offshore Well Intervention West Africa 2021 virtual conference, Bhargava Ram Gundemoni, 3M Global Solutions Specialist, explained how better sand control can lead to better productivity and profitability.

Traditional practices used for the sand control selection (SCS) process are based on mature technologies and methodologies that fail to meet the key performance drivers. The metallic filter media has erosion limits that constrict the boundary condition of the traditional SCS practices which result in failing to meet the asset productivity demand and the performance drivers not being achieved in many cases.

An alternative to the traditional sand control approach

The solution is a change of metallic filter media to ceramic filter media of the screen. 3M’s solution is achieved by integrating a full-body ceramic part in the form of rings on a pre-perforated base pipe on to which ceramic rings are stacked and held with two end caps and with an external shroud on top. The stack of ceramic rings creates a slot opening which is designed for the application spec-in. The ceramic material at the inflow offers higher erosion resistance, therefore mitigating hotspotting potential. This allows the operator a wider operating window of productivity.

Erosion constraint on the metallic filter media limits the well operating limits, limiting the productivity potential and the application envelope of applying a standalone screen system.

Using a ceramic filter media operators have proven in green fields and brown fields to shift the boundary conditions of applying stand-alone screens as demonstrated in the below picture, and achieved reduced risk to erosion failure and increase productivity. 3M Ceramic Sand Screens offers operational simplicity, reduced HSE risk to unlock production potential with faster return on investment by enabling standalone screen deployment as a simple sand control tool to address in a wider range of reservoir conditions

 

 

Standardised field-wide approach

Ceramic Sand Screens unlocks the operator methodology to achieve a simplified and standardised sand control approach in wide range of reservoir conditions and well architecture as downhole sand control system in OH, cased hole on a rig or through tubing rigless applications. Ceramic Sand Screens have been deployed and delivered success in 120+ applications with homogenous, heterogeneous, well-sorted to poorly sorted, low to high fines reservoir of sand properties.

To emphasis the effectiveness of the solution Ram presented three case studies from different regions across the globe.

Remedial sand control in a subsea re-perforated well intervention vessel in the North Sea

Customer challenge: The oil well was not operational due to depletion with a gas cap identified shallower to main zone. The operator intended to cost-effectively exploit the gas cap using rigless deployment method to add additional revenue from the existing asset. The project also needed to run a stand-alone sand screen in the open sea and through a subsea lubricator and required sub-sea well (deviated) intervention in harsh deployment conditions. The well downhole environment was extremely erosional and a reliable, robust solution was required to prevent failure at a reasonable cost.

Solution: The operator opted for ceramic sand screen deployment on a light well intervention vessel and run the screen through an e-line wireline system with an expandable packer system through open sea into the sub-sea lubricator.

Results and value creation: The operator was able to achieve production rates of 45 MMSCFD of gas sand-free through the solution. The 3M ceramic sand screen for this project was deployed successfully in April 2016 and was replicated in other wells with the same scope of work.

Marginal gas fields in Indonesia with ceramic sand screens

Customer challenge: The operator had to deal with marginal reserves with stacked reservoirs and was a low-cost environment. High flux velocity expected at sand face due to shallow and low-pressure, short intervals and needed robust and rigless deployable solution to achieve economical sense with heterogenous sand properties being a challenge.

Solution: High erosion and hot spotting resistant ceramic screens enable the operator to set across the perforation zone which are deployed on slickline with one or two pup joints depending on the perforation length.

Value creation: The operator achieved cost savings of up to 70% compared to the previous sand control approach and was able to increase reservoir deliverability by more than 200% of the average cumulative gas produced. The operator can now complete more zones per year and achieving a sand-free higher cumulative production volume, extending as a standardised approach to multiple assets as a primary sand control method.

Ceramic sand screens in high rate oil wells in Azerbaijan

Customer challenge: The operator had no sand control in place. With reservoir maturing and downhole conditions changed over time, sand production increased to a level where production targets are not achieved leading to well shut-in to integrate downhole sand control. Key challenges in selection of sand control are achieving cost-effective sand control approach without needing a rig in well conditions of high Fines, poorly distributed reservoir sand PSD with fluid flow at high flux and impingement velocity

Solution: 3M ceramic sand screens length of 203 ft, were set across 9 ⅝ inch casing perforation using coil tubing deployment method.

Value creation: The operator achieved ROI within five days based on the current oil price and was able to clock a sand-free production rate of 8000 BOPD and 46 MMSCFD gas. The operator also recorded a production gain of 2500 BOPD sand-free. Significant improvement on the PI over time exceeding the expectation of a standalone screen in such reservoir sand distribution with a low cost of deployment at reduced carbon footprint installing sand control mitigating need of a rig.

Solutions to maximise profitability

As of Oct 31 2021, 3M has completed 125 installations for sand control with users consisting of 50% oil producers and 50% gas producers. For general intervention applications 3M has maintained a manufacturing time of 6-12 weeks with variables such as size, quantity and shipping time to location.

3M remarked that the solution can help operators meet future energy policies to reduce carbon intensity for deployment with rigless approach where feasible and reduce the sand control future repairs offering a robust solution. The simple stand-alone screen and faster deployment means reducing HSE, operational risk and mean time between failures.

3M added, “There are a lot of wells globally where operators can unlock production potential from their shut-in wells due to failed primary sand control or from thin-bed reservoirs or reservoirs which have not been exploited because they are deemed un-economic and left behind the casing. 3M’s ceramic sand-screens enables an operator to approach such cases using a rig-less method, without the removal of tubing and requirement of a complex rig sand control solution. 3M has proven this at multiple fields and assets globally.”

With a field track record of 125 successful application, operators in West Africa can find proven results from similar conditions to their reservoirs as reference case study.

To learn more about Ceramic Sand Screens, visit: https://www.3m.com/3M/en_US/oil-and-gas-us/ceramic-sand-screens/

If interested in such a simplified solution to unlock the production potential assets by addressing sand control challenges, contact Bhargava Ram Gundemoni: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Riserless Light Well Intervention (RLWI) is proving to be a cost-effective method of intervening in West Africa’s offshore wells, using suitable support vessels instead of rigs.

A panel of industry experts came together at the Offshore Well Intervention West Africa 2021 conference to discuss the risks posed by RLWI and how the industry is perceiving new technologies driving the uptake of such activities.

Chiwuike Amaechi, Principal Subsea Intervention Engineer of SNEPCo, said that value realisation is one of the key risks that need to be considered when picking an intervention method. “Categories for this include production enhancement and well integrity. The economic threats are mainly around the fears of obtaining the projected production gains which would justify the investment into the intervention,” he added.

Elaborating on the challenges related to environmental safety, he said it is difficult to clean out a well in a purely riserless intervention. “How do you ensure that you do not release any hydrocarbons to the environment, particularly in places where there are strict regulatory requirements and organisations that have a zero spill policy? These are some of the roadblocks that we face in the implementation of riserless interventions,” Chiwuike said.

Oladapo Ajayi, Division Geounit Manager of Reservoir Performance in Nigeria and West Africa, Schlumberger, also gave his insights on the topic from a well service company’s perspective. He said they usually look at factors like water depth, climate and most importantly, the commercial aspect. “There’s always the triple constraint – time, cost and quality of the performance. In terms of time, the schedule and planning are important and when we say cost, we mean the budget we are looking at.”

According to Andrea Sbordone, Business Development Manager for TIOS, the risk associated with RLWI does not increase alongside depth. “We see RLWI as a better option from an environmental perspective, as the impact is significantly lower and the number of people needed is less too,” he said, adding that operators who have not used RLWI before have now become much more comfortable after using it once.

Moderator Thomas Angell, Director of Offshore Network, said that the idea of ‘horses for courses’ might have changed in the last 5 to 10 years in the intervention field, and Sbordone opined that flexibility is important, and one should be prepared for surprises. “In the last 15 years, the kind of operations you can do on e-line have been increasing, the gap (with coiled tubing) is reducing slowly.” Agreeing with his co-panelist, Oladapo Ajayi said that indeed the gap has reduced in comparison to previous years.

As new technologies have entered the market, the panelists stressed the idea that these need to be properly tested before they can be utilised. “We do need to see technologies matured somewhere else. It is always good to have seen it work beforehand and find out the success rate as well as what failed for learning,” informed Chiwuike.

Sbordone noted that, in terms of downhole solutions, new technology is released every year which is deployable from a riserless light well intervention vessel such as sealing technologies for example. In terms of conveyance he added there has been big steps taken forward and riserless coil tubing solutions, for instance, are making significant progress to be field-proven.

“Last year, we did a campaign of riserless coiled tubing coring in Norway, in water depths up to 3085 m. We deployed riserless coil tubing 14 times. This confirms that water depth is not an issue for riserless coil tubing. Times are changing and people are becoming more adaptable to new technologies.

“15 years ago, if you asked a coil tubing provider to put coil tubing through open water as a pumping downline in 2,000 m, they would be apprehensive to agree. However, slowly the industry started doing it and now it is pretty much the standard,” he added. There has not been a change in the technology used, what has changed is its acceptance and the operators’ confidence in using it.

Stressing on the need for true competency and integration for achieving efficiency, Sbordone said crew integration is important. “This integration is not just for equipment but also for people. The crew working on different parts of the operation should know each other’s work and coordinate the activities to achieve high efficiency.” Chiwuike agreed, highlighting there are significant benefits in efficiency and cost that service providers have been able to bring by offering an integrated solution with vessels that incorporate a complete light well intervention package executed by a core crew that have developed experience through various campaigns.

He added the appetite for RLWI is increasing in West Africa, noting that there were three RLWI campaigns ongoing in West Africa in 2019 in three different countries for three different operators, with three different suppliers. “We believe intervention activity is increasing and will continue to do so.”

Oladapo Ajayi said, “Light intervention is the way, in terms of the efficiency that we gain. There is a full appetite for this kind of work and, for me, technology is the main thing to drive this. Digital can open a new horizon of growth in offshore intervention business and help identify candidate wells, provide a complete portfolio of intervention options to select the optimum solution as well as being able to ensure a predicable successful outcome.”

“The advancement in the digital space provides opportunities for the ability to better risk assess operations and, therefore, make calls on probability of success during the planning stages. Thus, more digital operations ahead of time can be utilised to better improve efficiency of the actual operations. In addition, better planning and utilisation of assets should result in cost reduction. All of this is only possible based upon information sharing between operators and service providers being the key,” he continued.

Angell concluded, “There is now a real understanding of the difference between cost and price and value. These are three things we understand really well known when it comes to complex well programmes.

“The providers out there are the right ones to make this a reality. It would be great to return next year for this conference and listen to some of the projects that everyone has done in that window.”