Integration of Drilling Services, the Key to Excellence in Design and Execution

Abstract

Abu Dhabi Company for Onshore Oil Operations (ADCO), one of the major Oil and Gas producers in the United Arab Emirates embarked in a new challenge to drill and exploration well in a new field that had only one offset well drilled in the 1980's. ADCO planned to have a step change in how to manage risk, engineering and operations in order to enhance drilling performance and reduce non-productive time while maintaining the highest HSE standards. A detail risk management plan and engineering process was developed and the main drilling services were bundle for the most critical well sections 12.25Љ and 8.5Љ in order to guarantee seamless operations.The results of the implementation of this methology as well as the new initiative based on an active participation and cooperation between ADCO and the Drilling Service Company in all the phases of the well were outstanding and exceeded management expectations with regards to enhancement in drilling performance by optimizing ROP; reduction on NPT by reducing wellbore stability problems; ensuring high quality data acquisition; minimizing well cost.The excellent results achieved in this exploration well included safely drilling and in an efficient manner, considering that very limited historical data was available, the power of drilling services integration proven to be the foundation of success. Other important achievements were the use of the latest logging technology to extract the formation fluid from tight formations in an optimum time; without any doubt drilling the 8.5Љ section was the most challenging due to the expected concentration of H2S (~27%) with an increase of 2.3 times the ROP compared to offset wells; this was exceeding ADCO's expectations.The aim of this document is to describe how the risk management plan was integrated into the drilling program from the planning phase to the operation phase in combination with the technical expertise and drilling technologies fit to propose provided by the Drilling Service Company the knowledge and experience of the operator lead to develop specific solutions for the main risk and challenges of drilling this exploration well. The paper also describes how the use of the bundle service model which used to integrate all drilling services which became a key factor during the critical stages of the execution phase.