Drilling with a positive-displacement motor and a rotary-steerable system on 31/2-in. Coiled tubing in the San Juan Basin
Conference Paper
Overview
Identity
Additional Document Info
Other
View All
Overview
abstract
As the demand for oil and gas increases, operating companies have begun to explore alternatives to drilling with conventional rigs. One promising approach is to drill wells with coiled tubing rather than drill pipe. While great successes have been achieved with coiled tubing in small diameter reentry projects with Orienters and Positive Displacement Motors (PDMs), their use for large diameter, directional wells has never been explored. Schlumberger and BP evaluated the feasibility of this concept by drilling a series of wells for BP America using a combination of Rotary Steerable System (RSS) and PDM in the San Juan Basin. BP's projects in the San Juan Basin are gas wells, of between 2500 and 7500 ft. depth, depending on the target formation. The coiled tubing was used in two different applications. Firstly, to drill 6 1/4" hole to 2500 ft. to explore the shallow coal-seam gas and secondly to drill the 8 3A" section to 4000 ft. as the intermediate section for deeper wells. This demonstrated that drilling with the RSS and PDM assembly, in conjunction with Coiled Tubing, has several advantages over conventional drilling. The major benefits observed when drilling with coiled tubing are increased ROP due to the elimination of connection time , elimination of the need for controlled drilling and the ease of directional steering for different well profiles. This paper discusses the pre-job engineering, the lessons learned whilst executing the job and the conclusions reached as to the benefits and capabilities of such a system. Copyright 2007, Society of Petroleum Engineers.
