Steady-State Cuttings Transport Simulation in Horizontal Borehole Annulus

Ignatenko, Yaroslav; Bocharov, Oleg; Gavrilov, A. A.; May, Roland

doi:10.1115/omae2018-77266

Cited by 9 publications

(3 citation statements)

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“… Compared to tetrahedral meshes, structured hexahedral meshing is the predominantly applied meshing style in most CFD studies. 41,[208][209][210] This may be attributed to the nature of the annular geometry; thus reducing the risk of unstable and diverging simulations.…”

Section: Application Of Cfdmentioning

confidence: 99%

A review of technological advances and open challenges for oil and gas drilling systems engineering

Epelle

Gerogiorgis

2019

AIChE Journal

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The ever-increasing quest to identify, secure, access and operate oil and gas fields is continuously expanding to the far corners of the planet, facing extreme conditions towards exploring, securing and deriving maximum fluid benefits from established and unconventional fossil fuel sources alike: to this end, the unprecedented geological, climatic, technical and operational challenges have necessitated the development of revolutionary drilling and production methods. This review paper focuses on a technological field of great importance and formidable technical complexity -that of well drilling for fossil fuel production. A vastly expanding body of literature addresses design and operation problems with remarkable success: what is even more interesting is that many recent contributions rely on multidisciplinary approaches and reusable Process Systems Engineering (PSE) methodologies -a drastic departure from ad hoc/one-use tools and methods of the past.The specific goals of this review are to first, review the state of art in active fields within drilling engineering, and explore currently pressing technical problems, which are in dire need, or have recently found, PSE-and/or CFD-relevant solutions. Then, we illustrate the methodological versatility of novel PSE-based approaches for optimization and control, with an emphasis on contemporary problems.Finally, we highlight current challenges and opportunities for truly innovative research contributions, which require the combination of best-in-class methodological and software elements in order to deliver applicable solutions of industrial importance. Well drilling in the oil and gas industryThe annual increase in global energy demand and the diverse applications of conventional & unconventional oil and gas resources are indicative of the fact that these resources will continuously remain relevant to humanity in the far future. With increasing climate change concerns, natural gas already provides a promising transition between some oil-based fuels and renewables in the long run, despite its well-known transportation difficulties. 1 It can be further argued that natural gas represents an economically attractive option for electricity generation (particularly in the US where shale gas is naturally abundant) with significantly reduced greenhouse gas emissions compared to coal; thus increasing its market demand. 2 These reasons have warranted the advancements in technologies of

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Section: Application Of Cfdmentioning

confidence: 99%

A review of technological advances and open challenges for oil and gas drilling systems engineering

Epelle

Gerogiorgis

2019

AIChE Journal

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“…e height of the cuttings bed decreases with increase in effective viscosity of the drilling fluid in annulus flow [12]. Increase in effective viscosity can reduce the cuttings bed area [13].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Computational Fluid Dynamics Study of the Effects of Drill Cuttings on the Open Channel Flow

Welahettige

Berg

Lundberg

et al. 2019

International Journal of Chemical Engineering

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A three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics (CFD) study was carried out for drilling fluid flow with drill cuttings in open channels. The flow is similar to the return flow when drilling, stream containing drilling fluid, and drill cuttings. The computational model is under the framework of the Eulerian multifluid volume of the fluid model. The Herschel–Bulkley rheological model was used to describe the non-Newtonian rheology of the drilling fluid, and the computational model was validated with experimental results for two-phase flow in the literature. The effect of flow depth and flow velocity in an open channel was studied for drill cutting size of up to 5 mm and for a solid volume fraction of up to 10%. For constant cross section and short open channels, the effect of drill cuttings on flow depth and mean velocity was found to be small for particle sizes less than 5 mm and solid volume fractions less than 10%. High momentum force in the downward direction can carry the solid-liquid mixture at higher velocities than a lower density mixture. Higher inclination angles mean that the gravity effect upon the flow direction is more significant than the particle friction for short channels.

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“…If the drill pipe rotation speed is too high and the eccentricity is too large, the annulus pressure drop in a horizontal well will increase [17,18], enhancing the resistance and the torque generated in the liquid-solid mixture [19]. Large cuttings size will reduce the transport efficiency and is not conducive to wellbore cleaning [20][21][22][23]. The higher the apparent viscosity of the drilling fluid, the better is the transport performance of the cuttings at low drilling fluid velocities, but the greater is the pressure loss [24][25][26].The conventional method for cuttings transport uses a constant drilling fluid flow rate.…”

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confidence: 99%

Cuttings Transport Using Pulsed Drilling Fluid in the Horizontal Section of the Slim-Hole: An Experimental and Numerical Simulation Study

Zhu

Shen

et al. 2019

Energies

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Poor transport of cuttings in horizontal sections of small-bore well holes leads to high torque and increases the risk of the drill becoming stuck, reducing its service life and posing a threat to safe operation. Because the conventional cuttings transport method cannot effectively remove the cuttings bed, a transport method using pulsed drilling fluid based on a shunt relay mechanism is proposed. A three-layer numerical simulation model of cuttings transport in horizontal small-bore wells is established. Using both experiments and numerical simulations, the cuttings transport is studied in terms of the moving cuttings velocity, cuttings concentration, and distance of movement of the cuttings bed. By varying the pulsed drilling fluid velocity cycle, amplitude, and duty cycle at the annulus inlet, their effects on cuttings transport are analyzed, and the optimal pulse parameters are determined. The results show that the use of pulsed drilling fluid can effectively enhance the moving cutting velocity and transport distance of the cuttings bed, reduce the cuttings concentration, and improve wellbore cleaning.According to experimental investigations and numerical simulations of cuttings transport, this is subject to a number of variables, including cuttings size, drill pipe rotation, and drill pipe eccentricity. Drill pipe rotation will increase the transport efficiency of cuttings in a horizontal wellbore [14,15]. When the drill pipe eccentricity exceeds a certain value, the height of the cuttings bed increases sharply, resulting in high torque and the possibility of the drill becoming stuck [16]. If the drill pipe rotation speed is too high and the eccentricity is too large, the annulus pressure drop in a horizontal well will increase [17,18], enhancing the resistance and the torque generated in the liquid-solid mixture [19]. Large cuttings size will reduce the transport efficiency and is not conducive to wellbore cleaning [20][21][22][23]. The higher the apparent viscosity of the drilling fluid, the better is the transport performance of the cuttings at low drilling fluid velocities, but the greater is the pressure loss [24][25][26].The conventional method for cuttings transport uses a constant drilling fluid flow rate. According to simulations based on the three-layer numerical model, when the height of the cuttings bed in the annulus exceeds a critical value, the movement distance of cuttings bed is reduced to the extent that the cleaning effect in the wellbore cannot reach its desired target. To improve transport, a method with pulsed drilling fluid has been proposed. This provides a continuous impact on the cuttings by changing the flow rate of the drilling fluid. Pulsed jet drilling technology can effectively increase the drilling speed [27], and so downhole drilling tools using pulsed jets are equipped with variable-frequency pulse jet generators [28] and spiral pressure intensifiers [29]. Field experiments have shown that the use of pulsed drilling fluid reduces the effect of chipping and increases the effi...

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Steady-State Cuttings Transport Simulation in Horizontal Borehole Annulus

Cited by 9 publications

References 0 publications

A review of technological advances and open challenges for oil and gas drilling systems engineering

A review of technological advances and open challenges for oil and gas drilling systems engineering

Computational Fluid Dynamics Study of the Effects of Drill Cuttings on the Open Channel Flow

Cuttings Transport Using Pulsed Drilling Fluid in the Horizontal Section of the Slim-Hole: An Experimental and Numerical Simulation Study

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