Data-driven, or top-down, modeling uses machine learning and data mining to develop reservoir models based on measurements, rather than solutions of governing equations. Seminole Services’ Powerscrew Liner System is a new expandable-liner hanger that is set with torsional energy from the topdrive. Stuck pipe has traditionally been a challenge for the oil and gas industry; in recent years, operators have become even more determined to reduce the effect of stuck-pipe issues. The primary purpose of this study is to develop a method that overcomes the restrictions of rock-mechanics tests with respect to unconventional shale formations. The Earth is complex in all directions, and hydrocarbon traps require closure—whether structural or stratigraphic or both—in three dimensions.

A study using a dynamic multiphase-flow software simulated a rapid-unloading event and determined the gas fraction in the riser annulus and the effect on riser fluid levels. The Troll field is one of the largest gas producers discovered off Norway, but ensuring its long-term future required finding ways to drill wells in an increasingly fragile formation to develop its rich oil reserves. The list of wells drilled using dual gradient includes one drilled in the “eastern Gulf of Mexico,” which could be more precisely described as offshore Cuba. A previous attempt to drill an exploration well in ultradeep water in the Gulf of Mexico (GOM) did not reach its objective.

The Troll field is one of the largest gas producers discovered off Norway, but ensuring its long-term future required finding ways to drill wells in an increasingly fragile formation to develop its rich oil reserves. Statoil, operating the Troll field in the Norwegian sector of the North Sea, wished to run a deep sidetrack from the main bore in a multilateral well that would exit through the liner in the reservoir.

The chapter 11 filing comes as record-low crude prices and excess supply have impacted operations across the industry. About 2,500 jobs could be at stake. Can Putting Blockchain on Drilling Rigs Really Get Everyone on the Same Screen? Having blockchain on an oil rig means everyone on the job shares a view of a project from start to finish. This could facilitate innovations that cut costs, but organizational change is required.

Africa (Sub-Sahara) Sound Energy identified significant gas shows at the first Tendrara well onshore Morocco. Drilled to a 2665-m measured vertical depth, the well hit a total gross pay interval of 89 m of gas. The full set of well logs are being processed before the startup of rigless mechanical reservoir stimulation operations, which will be followed by a well test. The company is the operator of the well with a 55% working interest. Office National de HydroCarbures et des Mines (25%) and (20%) are the other participants. Petroceltic reported that the AT-13 well in Algeria has penetrated a 240-ft gas- and condensate-bearing formation. The well will help establish and maintain the approved annual average wet gas plateau rate of 355 MMcf/D from the Ain Tsila field.

Africa (Sub-Sahara) Tullow Oil announced in mid-August that first oil has flowed from the Tweneboa, Enyenra, and Ntomme (TEN) fields offshore Ghana, which was on time and on budget for the project's development plan approved by the government in May 2013. The company expects oil output to ramp up gradually through the rest of the year toward a production facility capacity of 80,000 B/D. Tullow is the operator of the TEN fields with a 47.18% stake. Its joint-venture partners are Anadarko (17%), Kosmos Energy (17%), Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (15%), and PetroSA (3.82%). Asia Pacific Rosneft has made a discovery at the PLDD well in the Wild Orchid gas condensate field in Block 06.1 of the Nam Con Son Basin offshore Vietnam. The discovery is being evaluated for the volume of reserves and commercial attractiveness, and there is a potential synergy with the nearby Rosneft-operated Lan Tay production platform, the company said.

The decision comes 2 months after UK shale operator Cuadrilla Resources halted stimulation work at its Preston New Road site in Lancashire because of a magnitude 2.9 seismic event. The UK shale operator will move forward with fracturing and testing its second well at its Lancashire site despite strict constraints on induced seismicity that hampered fracturing work on its first well. UK’s first horizontal shale well has yielded positive results after an initial flow test. But further testing—and fracturing of a second well—will have to come amid a continuation of UK’s stringent regulations on induced seismicity. Small quantities of gas and water are flowing to the surface from the UK’s first horizontal shale well—just days after operator Cuadrilla paused injection work for a second time amid earthquakes.

Pressurized-mud-cap drilling (PMCD) and early kick detection (EKD) are two unconventional drilling techniques that have been used widely individually, mostly in relation to closed and pressurizable systems and to managed-pressure-drilling (MPD) applications.

The data collected via monitoring and metering applications are increasingly viewed as central to assessing production performance and in decision making to optimize field development and operations. Intervention and workover operations can significantly affect the structural integrity and fatigue life of subsea-wellhead systems. Methodologies for wellhead-fatigue analysis have improved, but have yet to account for thermal effects along the well. Moving to higher-capacity wellhead systems for high-pressure and high-temperature (HP/HT) environments will require a larger mandrel and conductor-casing size.

This paper presents a newly designed triaxial fracturing system and describes a series of experiments that verified the validity of tool-free chemical diversion for multistage fracturing of openhole horizontal wells. The case history presented in the complete paper describes the performance of an acid-fracturing intervention in an HP/HT well in which this intervention was the last procedure considered to evaluate the productivity of a Marrat Formation well.