Subsea Re-Injection of Drilled Cuttings - Operational Experience

Saasen, Arild; Tran, T. N.; Joranson, Havard; Meyer, E.; Gabrielsen, Glenn; Tronstad, A.E.

doi:10.2523/67733-ms

Cited by 10 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…Therefore, use of oil based drilling fluids is common. In the northern part these regional sand formations are absent, and re-injection has been found to be complicated 1 . Oil based drilling fluids are though still used on some northern fields.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Successful Water Based Drilling Fluid Design for Optimizing Hole Cleaning and Hole Stability

Kjosnes

Løklingholm

Saasen

et al. 2003

SPE/IADC Middle East Drilling Technology Conference and Exhibition

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fax 01-972-952-9435. AbstractWater based drilling fluids have been used in many North Sea drilling operations during the last decades. Traditionally, a high focus has been directed towards creating inhibitive drilling fluids with high low shear rate viscosity for optimising cuttings transport and intact cuttings on the shaker. It has, however, been recognized that there is no direct connection between cuttings quality and hole stability. In the current field it was also found that a low gel/viscosity drilling fluid is effective in transporting cuttings out of the wellbore. Following this, the content of high molecular weight polymers have been reduced and exchanged with low molecular weight polymers to enhance hole cleaning throughout the last years. Fewer cuttings are entrapped in beds down hole and are transported up to the surface. The current paper demonstrates how this low viscous/low gel strength drilling fluid contributed to improved drilling performance, where an improvement in tripping time, casing running speeds and total drilling time was observed.In addition to changes in the viscosity a wide range in NaCl and KCl salt concentrations and mixtures have been tried and field tested. The project is currently using only a moderate concentration of KCl, which has improved hole stability. The frequency of unstable hole occurrences in a particular troublesome formation are today greatly reduced by using lower KCl salt concentration and improved well design.The current paper explains in detail how the drilling fluid design optimizes the chemical performance and the hole cleaning performance during the drilling operation. The drilling performance for this particular field improved significantly during the last three years where the total drilling time was reduced with roughly 50% compared to earlier practice. The reasons for the improvements are mainly the changes in well design combined with the use of an effective WBM system.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Successful Water Based Drilling Fluid Design for Optimizing Hole Cleaning and Hole Stability

Kjosnes

Løklingholm

Saasen

et al. 2003

SPE/IADC Middle East Drilling Technology Conference and Exhibition

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“…16,17 Drill cuttings and associated drilling waste from more than a dozen wells have been injected into 9 annuli by the end of year 2000 at Statoil's the Åsgard field. 16,17 Drill cuttings and associated drilling waste from more than a dozen wells have been injected into 9 annuli by the end of year 2000 at Statoil's the Åsgard field.…”

Section: Review Of Case Historiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For example, solid settling and plugging have occurred in a number of operations. 17 Table 1 shows lessons learned from DCRI operations (from both on-shore and offshore DCRI operations) and a brief list of mitigation options. 20,21 Several release incidents of injected slurry to the environment due to inadequate cementing have also been reported.…”

Section: Lessons Learnedmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…BP, through a Drilling Engineering Association (DEA) JIP, conducted the first field trial DCRI operation in March 1993 into the annulus of a subsea well from a mobile offshore drilling module unit (MODU). 17 Other companies have also recently conducted subsea drilling and/or production waste disposal operations or trials. 16 By the end of year 2000, over a dozen subsea re-injection operations have been conducted in 9 annuli by Statoil at the Åsgard field.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Drilling and Production Waste Injection in Subsea Operations - Challenges and Recommendations

Abou-Sayed

Guo

2002

All Days

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Handling drilling and production waste associated with oily contaminated drill cuttings, NORM and produced water is an environmental and economic issue in offshore drilling and production operations.There are a number of waste management options and subsea injection into suitable geological formations can be a preferred one. This is because it can achieve zero discharge operations; eliminating transportation and spill risks. It can also be economically favorable. Although subsea drill cuttings and produced water re-injection operations have been conducted in an environmentally acceptable manner, system design and operational experience are limited. A few worldwide drill cuttings re-injection operations from mobile offshore drilling units are reviewed first in the paper. Lessons learned from these and other system design and operational experience include a detailed subsurface study and careful engineering, wellhead and injection system design and effective communication to handle emergency disconnect, quality control on well integrity and slurry injection procedure. Challenges and best practice guidelines for waste injection operations from subsea wellheads are given to minimize failure and maximize success.

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“…10 CRI operations started from onshore to offshore fixed platform to deepwater mobile offshore drilling module. [11][12][13][14] It has been operated worldwide within very different environments.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Increased Assurance of Drill Cuttings Re-Injection - Challenges, Recent Advances and Case Studies

Guo¹,

Thomas²,

Adriana³

2004

Proceedings of IADC/SPE Asia Pacific Drilling Technology Conference and Exhibition

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fax 01-972-952-9435. AbstractThe handling of drill cuttings and wastes is both an environmental and economic issue in drilling operations. With ever-tightening environmental regulations and the green operation initiatives of operators, drill cuttings re-injection (CRI) into a subsurface geology often is the preferred option as it allows operators to achieve zero discharge since oily cuttings are returned to their place of origin.When the technology started about a decade ago, injection into a single well had a maximum slurry volume of approximately 30,000 bbl. Now, particularly in very large projects, several million barrels of slurry may be injected into a single well. This represents more than a 1000 times the volume of a typical hydraulic fracturing job or more than 100 times that of those earlier cuttings re-injections. In some cases, the success of the CRI operation is critical because there either are no back-up options or the economic and environmental impacts are too significant. This paper describes the challenges faced in CRI projects, along with recent advances and experiences gained in tackling these challenges through modeling, cuttings slurry and operational procedure design, monitoring and verification. For example, much progress has been made recently in slurry rheology design and operational procedure selection such as suspension/displacing to avoid loss of injectivity and to maximize disposal capacity and minimize HSE issues.The authors also will present a risk-based approach, which integrates deterministic software and tools, available data, knowledge and experience, for modeling of geological and operational uncertainties and potential risks to increase the quality assurance. Case examples will be presented to illustrate the value of this integrated approach. Best practice guidelines and recommendations will be provided on data collection, design and engineering, operation and monitoring.

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Subsea Re-Injection of Drilled Cuttings - Operational Experience

Cited by 10 publications

References 11 publications

Successful Water Based Drilling Fluid Design for Optimizing Hole Cleaning and Hole Stability

Successful Water Based Drilling Fluid Design for Optimizing Hole Cleaning and Hole Stability

Drilling and Production Waste Injection in Subsea Operations - Challenges and Recommendations

Increased Assurance of Drill Cuttings Re-Injection - Challenges, Recent Advances and Case Studies

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