Offshore Well Intervention Latin America 2021 bought together a number of industry specialists to discuss the past, present and future of well integrity and transformative technologies in the pipeline.
Representatives from MADCON Corporation, EV, Quartic Advisory, Petrobras and PetroRio joined the panel to tackle the current challenges and transformative technologies that could rise to meet them.
On the key challenges facing well integrity, Ivo Foianini, Business Development Manager at EV, explained, "Overall, the issue of the use of cement has always been a problem. The way wells have been designed in the oil field has been a problem for the focus of either remediation for well integrity or abandoning wells. Cement is a great product to hold structural integrity and withstand the passage of fluid, but being able to properly place it behind pipe and detect where it is behind pipe is difficult. It remains a challenged route.”
"The other problem, as I see it, is corrosion. We use two components that don't age well- cement and steel. People have tried to reinforce steel with a lining, casing or resins, but, in general, we're using 20th century technology for the 21st century. We need to find ways to support them with better products or use new products from the future."
Vincent Stephane Geyl, Well Integrity Advisor at Quartic Advisory, added, "What I see as a technical challenge is data gathering. Conducting sufficient testing, gathering trends and analyses and combining them, is still a challenge.”
"All this data, designs, analyses and tests feeds into decision-making. The focus on making good decisions is much higher, but making decisions based on all the data is harder."
Jorge Ricardo Siqueira, Well Integrity Consultant at PetroRio, continued the discussion as the panellists turned to the innovative technologies to help combat the above problems and ensure well integrity in the long-term, the panel discussed designing wells for abandonment. Offshore areas in the North Sea and Gulf of Mexico are in the midst of a plug-and-abandonment wave, with post-plug wells not leaking after abandonment being at the forefront of many modern wells' designs.
Foianini explained, "It's an excellent idea- designing wells for abandonment. It gathers the well integrity aspect in it from a high level perspective. Operators don't have to deal with as many well integrity variables, because they're designed to be abandoned in the future."
Geyl continued, "New materials are the way forward- cement is just the lack of a better option. We've seen the deployment of bismuth in the North Sea as a barrier, putting minerals and elements as a barrier. There's a lot of work around exothermic reactions, to melt rock and casing to create a barrier.”
"One of the things I find so challenging is using the formation as a barrier. The solution is varied- using rock to seal is one of the best approach but it is tricky to demonstrate that each rock formation is sufficient enough to act as a barrier. We've seen efforts to recreate and re-mineralise formations within the well, but it's far ahead, in the future."
Bruce Trader, President of MADCON Corporation, contributed, "One company we're working with are a resin manufacturer in Louisiana. Resins have been considered for a while but they're working with the weight and density to improve the cost effectiveness."
"We are discussing how to use salt and rock as a barrier- it's not easier, but we are discussing it in Petrobras and with our clients- the challenge is to be sure we're doing it in a safe way," concluded Daniel Muller, Manager of Well and Subsea Integrity at Petrobras.
As part of the Offshore Well Intervention Latin America conference Martin Tardio Velasco, Regional Subsea Services and Wellheads Director at Baker Hughes, led a panel of experts to explore the uptake of riserless light well intervention (RLWI) in Brazil could be developed, what benefits it could bring to the industry there, and what are the obstacles standing in the way.
Setting the scene
Velasco opened the session with a short presentation on current state of the RLWI market and the offshore industry in Brazil. He noted that, according to Rystad estimations, the break even price on downstream projects had dropped to US$50 per barrel, down 10% in the last two years. In Brazil specifically, the break even price had dropped 30% in 2014-2018, falling a further 15% since then. Lower break even prices favour less drilling and maximising production from existing wells and this reduction has also largely been driven by innovations within the oil and gas industry.
Combined, these factors make an ideal setting for RLWI, a method of intervening subsea wells bringing operation efficiency, lower rates and overall much lower costs compared to semi-subs.
Velasco commented, “RLWI vessel days are rising across the globe. Brazil, however, is still somewhat of a virgin territory for it. We see a huge opportunity there and we think the market will change in that direction. The country has around 600 christmas trees installed outside of the last ten years and the significant age leaves room for both enhancement and P&A, especially from RLWI vessels.”
Switching to RLWI
Matthew Vick, Senior Subsea Wells Engineer, BP, noted that he had noticed a real shift to riserless in the last three/four years and his company had been making use of this method in regions such as the Gulf of Mexico (GOM) and Angola as the relaxed cost pressures (and the speed of mobilisation) makes it a much more economical solution.
He added that working in Angola would be similar to Brazil as there was a lack of expertise around RLWI. To patch this hole in the talent pool, BP took supervisors from the region to GOM to gain experience with the equipment.
Vick commented, “Most of the skills we need are available in the country from wireline tubing to pumping etc ‒ this is the standard bread and butter. It is just a small piece around well control equipment which is the last step. It takes some time to build that on experience but you can get there by identifying key individuals and building their experience in other regions.”
Echoeing these sentiments, Colin Nicol, Senior Operations Leader, Baker Hughes, said, “It is hard to take on new technology in less mature regions and sub-Saharan Africa is a good example. There are experience gaps, onshore and offshore so you need to identify the prevailing skills similar to the ones you need and identify the core people to train. We work with regional people but it has also be necessary to supplement them with senior personnel from GOM etc. Ultimately, we want people from the region to be comfortable with the assets prior to it arriving and make it sustainable in order to bleed back the amount of experienced people we need to parachute in. At some point you can then step away and make the region self-sufficient for RLWI operations.”
Velasco added, “There is a wide talent pool in Brazil and it has usually been quick to set up new technology. An example is the evolution of deepwater where it is now exporting talent for deepwater operations and I see similar potential with RLWI.”
P&A opportunities
Another opportunity for RLWI comes in the form of vessel availability. Nicol noted that the renewable market is gradually eating into the vessels used by the oil and gas industry and are using them on long term contracts. Particularly popular is larger vessels with bigger decks and high capacity cranes. With competition over rigs bound to drive prices higher, many operators may well turn to lighter vessels in order to enhance production on their assets or fulfil their obligations around P&A.
Continuing on the topic of P&A, Velasco commented, “In Brazil we still have some room to catch up in terms of P&Aing wells, a lot often get delayed. We foresee that with new regulations inbound this work will start picking up.”
The panellists noted that this trend could spell further opportunities for RLWI in Brazil as lighter vessels are able to perform such operations more efficiently and quicker, resulting on cost saving on what is traditionally an expensive venture. Additionally, RLWI capabilities are rapidly advancing. New technology allows RLWI to perform lower completion abandonment, cut and prep for pulling tubing and even tools to allow cement barriers to be placed across multiple annuli, making them a more viable option to rig based vessels.
Enhanced HSE
With ageing wells in Brazil also comes the problem that many were not designed to support the weight of some of the newer rigs entering operations. This can cause potential problems if the stress cannot be supported, a challenge much less severe to RLWI vessels.
Vick added that there are many other HSE advantages of utilising RLWI over rig-based operations. He noted that, for instance, on rigs personnel are much more exposed to hydrocarbons, often around ten metres from potentially flammable gas etc. Whereas on RLWI the well is isolated to the tree itself and the only hydrocarbons coming to surface is when taking the lubricator out or residue gas from testing. This is a big HSE risk reduction and improvement in personnel safety.
Presenting in a virtual webinar at OWI LATAM 2021, Bhargava Ram Gundemoni, 3M Global Solutions Specialist, showcased how operators can enhance their oil and gas production and how better sand control can lead to better productivity and profitability.
Beginning the presentation Ram spoke about simplified sand control and the general key performance drivers in sand control selection which are reducing equipment and personnel footprint, risk reduction to enhance safety and durability and finally, operational excellence - for increased productivity and increased return on investments.
Challenges and current market needs
The general market needs are to increase productivity for less cost and achieve less risk to failure. Traditional practices used for the Sand Control Selection (SCS) process are based on mature technologies and methodologies that often fail to meet the key performance drivers. Mature technologies often rely on a metallic filter media which is used as the mechanical sand control barrier downhole. Metallics filter media metrologically has erosion limits that constrict the boundary condition of hydrocarbon productivity. If a more erosion resistant filter material can be utilised, the upper safe operational window can be extended limiting the risk of erosional failure and hot spotting of the downhole sand control system whilst optimising asset recovery where possible. In addition, offering greater longevity to downhole sand control through a material change reduces the reported millions of dollars companies employ in repairing wells with failed sand control.
Disrupting the traditional sand control approach
The solution is a change of metallic filter media to ceramic filter media of the screen. This has been 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 hold 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 and the ceramic material at the inflow offers erosion resistance and therefore mitigating the hotspotting potential ‒ allowing the operator a wider operating window of productivity.
Ceramic Sand Screens have been proved by deployment in the industry both in green fields and in intervention wells, delivering operators Operational simplicity, Reduced HSE Risk at lower Capex delivering higher productivity. In some cases, Ceramic Sand Screens has been an enabling technology to unlock production potential with faster return on Investments.
Standardised field-wide approach with simplified stand-alone screen sand control
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 applications with homogenous, heterogeneous, well-sorted to poorly sorted, low to high fines reservoir of sand properties.
Uphole recompletion using ceramic sand screens in the Latin Americas.
Customer challenges:
The operator posed challenges such as recompleting an interval by installing a sand control through existing completion without the removal of tubing or utilisation of a” big rig”-side track. The well contained high gas rates, high flux velocity and impingement velocity through short net target zones which were expected. Non-uniform, unconsolidated sandstones, and aggressive nature of sand due to its morphology was also a critical factor in planning.
Solution:
A simple stand-alone screen solution to withstand high gas rates and across the perforations with cost-effective and deployment on a rigless wireline deployment method. The operator defined erosion testing to prove 200ft/s flux velocity prior to the sand pack.
Results and Value creation:
Adding more than 100mn scuffs per day (MMSCFD) to the asset from the zones left behind casing improved productivity and the results showed low skin of just one after 1.5 years of production and in some cases, zero skin was also recorded.
This application was further replicated in seven gas and two oil production wells with high production from short, perforated zones with flux velocity calculated to be 100 to 120 ft/s.
Low capex and high productivity: Marginal fields in Indonesia with ceramic sand screens
Customer challenge:
The operator had to deal with marginal reserves with stacked reservoirs - a challenging low-cost environment. The expected production rates from short, perforated interval leads to high flux velocity and under heterogenous sand particle distribution increases the risk to erosion failure. A downhole sand control solution required to address these challenges. A rigless deployable solution was critical to meet field economics.
3M solution:
Proven high erosion and hot spotting resistant ceramic screens enabled the operator to set the screens across the perforation zone deployed on slickline with one or two pup joints to space out the lower completion depending on perforation interval.
Value creation:
The operator achieved cost savings of up to 70% compared to the previous sand control approach. Diverging from traditional sand control methodology, embracing ceramic sand screens technology as a solution approach in a heterogenous sand particle distribution, not only drove savings on CAPEX but also enabled increase of reservoir deliverability by more than 200% of average cumulative gas produced, High erosion resistant screen properties were a key technology driver in this performance. With a more simplified and faster deployment methodology this approach has enabled the operator to maximise operational excellence in activating more wells in a year. Ceramic sand screens are now considered as standardised sand control technology and methodology within their assets.
As of August 31 2021, 3M has completed 115 installations for sand control with users consisting of 50% oil producers and 50% gas producers. According to 3M, the product also meets ISO 17824 / API 19SS Standards.
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:
At the OWI LATAM 2021 conference, Artur Barbosa, Business Development Manager at Archer, gave a presentation on secure and efficient P&A of wells, which focused on the company’s Stronghold Barrier setting and Barrier Verification systems, part of its suite of recovery and P&A solutions. The presentation demonstrated how the Stronghold systems provide an economical and effective alternative to traditional plug and abandonment (P&A).
Barbosa started by giving an overview of Archer, a global oil services company with a 45-year history and strong focus on safety. Its solutions support drilling services, well integrity, intervention, P&A and decommissioning. The company operates in 40 locations in 19 countries across the globe, with more than 5,000 employees.
“In our current portfolio we have 33 platforms, three subs, and two modular rigs, where we are responsible for operations, maintenance and certification of drilling equipment on these assets; rental division providing specialised equipment for offshore operations; engineering solutions for enhancing customers’ assets performance; cased hole wireline services; and oiltools, which provide solutions for well cleaning and cementing, slot recovery and P&A,” he explained.
“Archer can provide all these services in an integrated services contract model, reducing the interfaces with subcontractors and making Archer the focal point of drilling and well services activities,” he stressed.
Barbosa gave an outline of Archer’s wide-ranging capabilities and solutions across the well lifecycle from exploration and development through workover intervention, to abandonment and slot recovery. He emphasised that Archer can provide the customer full life cycle in P&A and slot recovery solutions for cut and pull, casing exit and barrier setting and verification.
“The advantage of the Stronghold barrier system is it eliminates the need for milling during P&A operations,” he explained.
“For barrier setting, the Stronghold Barricade system is designed to perforate a selected casing section, wash and clean and set a permanent barrier,” he said. It reduces P&A costs by creating a rock-to-rock barrier in one trip.
“The Barricade Plus is an improvement on the system; it deals with higher circulation and pressure and bypass capabilities, and is designed to deal with larger casing sizes,” he continued.
“For barrier verification we have the Defender, which is designed to verify the integrity of the barrier, and it’s the most efficient way for us to P&A a well.” It enables operators to perforate and test an annular barrier in a single trip.
“The Fortify is an improvement on this system, with a unique pressure verification system,” he went on.
Barbosa added that the company has conducted more than 200 successful jobs all over the globe, resulting in US$250mn in savings for customers.
Barbosa explained in detail the schematics and operation sequence of the systems, and shared some technical paper references where these technologies and their benefits are explored in depth. These include SPE-191528-MS (TotalEnergies), SPE-193945-MS (Aker BP), SPE-193989-MS (Shell) and SPE-197149-MS.
He also referred to a case study illustrating the successful deployment of the Stonghold Barricade in the Gulf of Mexico. In this case, a major deepwater operator needed to set a 330ft cross sectional cement barrier in 13 3/8” x20 casing. This well, in over 6,000 ft MD water depth required a cement barrier to be placed just above the 20” casing shoe in order to meet the qualifications to plug and abandon the well.
The Archer 13 3/8” Stonghold Barricade was successfully deployed for washing and cementing of the 330ft long interval with even rates at 1200 lpm. The tests run after performing the operation firmly tagged top of cement 6ft above the planned height, and a successful positive/negative test allowed the operator to move on with the completion of the plug and abandonment.
Barbosa gave another example of the application of the Barricade washing tool , where it was used with the Thor casing cleaning and recovery system, which is designed to perforate, clean and recover the casing in a single trip, the method being to move the friction in the casing, and recover the casing.
“The challenge is where we have significant barite, where it would be very time consuming to recover the casing, with multiple cutting required. With this solution we could make two cuts in the casing, perforate, wash out the barite, activate our plug and recover the casing. That was the business case for one of the jobs with our Thor system. In this case the customer was finding it difficult to pull the casings out, so we used our Samurai cutting tool to cut the casing with two cuts, then ran in hole with the Thor, washed the section and recovered the casing.”
The presentation stimulated a number of questions, which were addressed in a lively q&a session to conclude the session.
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.”
Frank's International (Frank’s), a global oil services company that provides a broad and comprehensive range of highly engineered tubular running services, tubular fabrication, and specialty well construction and intervention solutions, has received the inaugural 2021 Most Valuable Partner (MVP) Award from a major operator in recognition of its work in Guyana.
This award recognises Frank's work in helping their customer meet important operational goals both safely and efficiently. Frank's Tubular Running Services, Cementing and Well Integrity teams developed a customised solution involving multiple casing technologies, which eliminated the need to alternate tools and accommodated different casing types.
The solution enabled faster run times and removed the need for personnel to enter the hazardous red zone. Frank's first-rate operational planning and execution led to a record-setting casing string run, with a total of five hours saved and zero rejected connections with a fully nationalised night crew.
Specifically, the MVP award recognises the following categories and achievements:
-Safety, Security, Health and Environment (SSHE) Excellence: recognised as strong leaders and contributors in pre-tour and rig-floor meetings
-Reliability: excellent Non-Productive Time (NPT) performance demonstrating 99.8% up time
-Adaptability and Proactivity: onshore personnel engaged early and effectively collaborated
-Truly Working as a Partner: offshore personnel consistently demonstrated commitment to supporting activities on the rig outside of their base work scope.
"Congratulations to our Tubular Running Services, Cementing, and Well Integrity teams, including local crew members in Guyana," said York McCauley, Frank’s Senior Operations Manager, Caribbean. "These talented and dedicated team members consistently demonstrate operational excellence both onshore and offshore. This award is a testament to their hard work and dedication to delivering superior value, safety, and efficiency to our partners. We appreciate their outstanding contributions to Frank's operations."
Michael Kearney, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer, added, "Innovating to help our customers and going above and beyond is what distinguishes our talented team at Frank's. Thank you to our employees for living our core values of Safety, Integrity, Innovation, Diversity and Excellence every day."
Ashtead Technology, an integrated subsea technology and services provider, has penned a deal with Zetechtics, a leader in subsea control systems for ROV tooling intervention, to offer customers a range of new ROV tooling technologies.
The deal gives both organisations the scope to add further specialist equipment based on demand and will allow Ashtead Technology’s nine customer service hubs to offer an array of torque tools, control systems and associated peripherals from the subsea control systems specialist.
Ashtead Technology noted this was part of their strategy to continually develop and expand their capability to meet the diverse needs of their customers around the world, who operate in all areas of the global energy industry.
David Mair, Business Development Director for Ashtead Technology commented, “These new technologies offer improved performance, reliability and efficiency, as well as a greater level of user-friendliness. Zetechtics has 27 years of experience for us to draw on and this collaboration is set to add undeniable value to our customer’s operations.”
Alan Duncan, Commercial Director of Zetechtics, added, “Customers prefer to use modern, easily-supported equipment, with the type of technical features they would have access to if buying new. We are excited to collaborate with Ashtead Technology and by introducing a wide range of new equipment to the market in this way will enable their customers to unlock the potential of our market-leading solutions.”
Wärtsilä has revealed that in December 2020 it signed five year Optimised Maintenance agreement for two offshore well intervention vessels owned by Siem Offshore. Under the agreement Wärtsilä will provide real-time monitoring and support, using the latest digital technology, to reduce the fuel consumption and emissions of two well intervention vessels (the Siem Helix 1 and the Siem Helix 2) operating in Brazil’s offshore oil fields. The agreement also covers the selective catalytic reduction (SCR) emissions-abatement systems installed with the engines.
Wärtsilä will supply its Expert Insight predictive maintenance solution for use on the two vessels, an innovative service that leverage artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced diagnostics to monitor equipment and systems in real time, spot anomalies, foresee potential problems and enable rapid reaction. Also included is Wärtsilä’s Date Driven Maintenance concept which will enable the ship’s crew to conduct condition inspections using borescope optical instruments. These images can then be sent to Wärtsilä’s technical experts for evaluation, and in most cases will lengthen the time required between engine overhauls.
Finally, Wärtsilä will provide the vessels with the Lloyd class-approved connectivity solution with enhanced cyber security - an enabler for onshore digital tools providing cloud based services such as remote monitoring, remote optimisation and support.
Henrik Wilhelms, Director of Agreement Sales at Wärtsilä Marine Power, commented, “Lifecycle support is a key element of our strategy, and our advanced digital and data-based maintenance solutions are central to enabling optimal operational performance. The benefit of being able to efficiently monitor the equipment and support customers remotely is enhanced even more today, since due to Corona-related travel restrictions, in-person visits by service engineers can be difficult to arrange. Since our engineers need to travel less, their carbon footprint is reduced, while at the same time we can optimise the performance of the asset, so it is really a double win.”
Full steam ahead in 2021
Presently, Wärtsilä’s is enjoying a spell in the sun as services are in high demand. So far, in February alone, the company has also revealed agreements to provide Western Pacific Marine Ltd with the advanced hybrid solution for the new Ro-Ro ferry; to supply Norwegian based Solvang with digital Operational Performance Improvement & Monitoring (OPERIM) solution to support the operational efficiency of its fleet; to equip new under construction Isle of Man ferry with a range of comprehensive solutions; and sealed a strategic partnership with SAACKE, to strengthen the companies’ ability to offer a comprehensive range of leading technology solutions to shipyards and ship owners. While in their 2020 annual report Wärtsilä may have reported a contraction in financial performance, it appears they are full steam ahead to reconcile this lost ground in 2021.
Offshore network spoke with ANP to better understand the impact of changing regulations on the Brazilian well intervention market, most specifically future integrity & P&A projects. Below you can find comments on how the integrity & P&A market is changing and how to strategize for this going forward.
Access an outline of Brazil’s current oil and gas industry, sharing ANP’s new focus for well intervention
Hear Christian Kruger, VP Account Manager of Welltec discuss how powered mechanical interventions can help solve P&A challenges
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