Abandonment of Wells Under the New Norm – Sacrificial Tubing Approach

Abstract

This paper presents the success story of an exploration well in Malaysia evaluating the conventional approach of stacked cement plugs against the use of sacrificial tubing with a hydraulic disconnect sub system. Plug and Abandonment (P&A) is the process where the well is sealed permanently, and permanent well barrier must extend across the full cross section prior rig move. It is vital to ensure that plugged wells do not leak after abandonment, as there could be several potential leak paths or channeling from microannulus. Thus, well integrity shall be the utmost priority in designing the P&A strategy. Conventional P&A requires multiple cement plugs of a given length to be set and pressure tested, which could however be quite time-consuming and thus costly. The number of cement plugs will be based on the length of the open hole section, hydrocarbon zones presence or caprock to meet the P&A guidelines. The guidelines require that cement plugs be placed and tested across any open hydrocarbon-bearing formations, across all casing shoes, across freshwater aquifers, and perhaps several other areas near the surface. The thought process, design requirement both for the hardware and cement slurry, and execution follow through of a P&A approach with a sacrificial tubing method, driving for cost savings and operational efficiency will be elaborated. Some of the key points for replication based on lessons learnt are P&A with sacrificial tubing is economical justified for well scenario. As for the design, tubing centralizers or rotation is required in deviated hole for proper cement placement. Rotation of tubing during cementing is recommended for effective mud removal and cement placement for the case of no centralizer placement. This paper provides the novelty of the extensive planning, execution and improvement methods that will aid the project team to save cost and time in plug and abandonment (P&A) the well.