fax 01-972-952-9435. AbstractSolid expandable tubular technology presents an opportunity to significantly boost the production capacity of wells by increasing the size of the completion. As such, it offers an economically attractive and environmentally friendly option to breathe new life into gas fields. It is flexible in its application, and can be applied fast to react quickly to changes in future gas demand. It makes effective use of existing surface facilities, and does not affect abandonment costs. This paper describes the planning and installation of the world's first 7-5/8" 13Cr (13% Chromium) solid expandable tubular workovers in the F23 gas field in Sarawak. A significant amount of development work, modelling and testing was done to deliver components required for the installation. The solid expandable tubular workover resulted in an increase of 50% in well capacity for one of the wells of which the production results were known at the time of writing this paper.

This paper demonstrates the workflow of an integrated petrophysical, geomechanical sanding assessment and cement bond log evaluation to define a simple cut-off for reliable sand production assessments and well completion decisions. This workflow provides valuable insights for timely and fit-for-purpose sand management strategies particularly at early field life where the commonly used sanding prediction methodologies cannot be calibrated with field data because of the lack of sanding observations. The successful application of this methodology is shown in the Ichthys gas field, Browse Basin, with high rate and long high-angle producers with subsea wellheads and a long pipeline to an onshore plant. Advanced geomechanical analysis combing analytical and numerical sanding methodologies are used to define a single property cut-off for well-life sand-free production. The availability of such a simple cut-off has assisted the well construction engineers to follow a quick, cost-effective, simplified but thorough approach for sand production assessment and completion selection as opposed to being empirical, or too time consuming. The field first came on stream in July 2018. The workflow has been used in development wells and its validity and sand control decisions are confirmed, as to date all wells are producing sand-free. A similar workflow is being developed for the secondary target at some 400–500 m deeper for the subsequent phases of field development.