Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Horizontal wells are of great interest to the petroleum industry today because they
provide an attractive means for improving both production rate and recovery
efficiency. These are due to that horizontal wells provide a large-area of contact with
the reservoir than do vertical; wells and in addition, they provide a means for the
lateral transportation of fluid. Thus, the horizontal wells can be drilled as new wells or
horizontal sidetracks, drilled to revitalize the performance of exiting vertical wells that
are called drain holes The past few years have seen great improvement in drilling
technology. Development such as the use of bent, down hole drilling-motors, topdrive rigs and MWD (measurement while drilling) or advanced MWD called
geosteering technique together with steerable drill systems have greatly reduced cost.
Recent horizontal wells have cost no more per meter of well drilled than comparable
conventional wells. Thus, great advances have also been in methods for-drilling shortradius drain holes from existing vertical wells. The construction and placing of
horizontal wells has become routine Usually it is no longer speculative as to whether
horizontal wells can be drilled .In most cases now, the choice is not whether one can
drill horizontally but whether on should.
Great advances in the technology of drilling and locating horizontal wells continue to
be made. Today much attention is being paid to the problems of re-entering existing
vertical wells using smaller diameter, medium-radius and short-radius equipment.
These improvements will allow a much larger proportion of existing conventional
wells to have their live extended by re-completion with long, horizontal drain holes.
The provision of MWD tools that will operate in smaller diameter holes is a
particularly active area. There are developments, too, in logging tools. Tools are now
available that can be operated while drilling (LWD) to provide information about the
reservoir being encountered. Locating the logging sensors closer to the drill bit to
allow a more timely evaluation of the bit position and of the rock being penetrated is
1202/644
Horizontal drilling
1202/644
Horizontal drilling
1202/644
Horizontal drilling
1202/644
Horizontal drilling
Sand production
At higher draw down-pressure, sand production is a common problem especially the
production from unconsolidated and fire grained sand. Sand erodes and plugs the
equipment and restricting the flow rates. Screens and gravel placing limit sand entry
into the well bore and in some cases reduce productions rates, less pressure draw
down eliminates the need for screen and gravel placing and allows higher production
rates from drainhole or horizontal well.
1202/644
Horizontal drilling
1202/644
Horizontal drilling
sweep patterns,
1202/644
systems.
Horizontal drilling
It is important to note that the third requirement listed above limits the tools that can
be used in the horizontal part of the hole even through the curvature there is
negligible. These requirements place limitations on what can be achieved by mediumradius drilling. The requirement for drill string flexibility means drill strings must be
smaller in diameter for higher curvatures. At the limit, it is necessary, e.g., articulated
strings, coiled tubing type strings stressed beyond the elastic limit, and strings made of
exotic higher-strength the materials such as titanium, carbon fiber or steel-reinforced
hoses. Charges of this sort move the technique beyond the boundary of normal
medium-radius drilling.
The trend to using smaller diameter drill pipe goes along with the drilling of smaller
diameter holes. Another driving force moving the technology towards small diameters
is the incentive to drill horizontal drains starting with existing vertical wells. To do this,
1202/644
Horizontal drilling
1202/644
Horizontal drilling
Over View
1202/644
Horizontal drilling
Horizontal Well Profiles
1202/644
Horizontal drilling
1) Vertical section:
It is drilled from seabed (mud line) until kick-off point (KOP).
3) Horizontal section:
It is drilled from the end of second build arc (EOC) to the end of proposed
distance to be drilled horizontally in the pay zone, in accordance with the type of
horizontal well to be drilled.
1202/644
Horizontal drilling
1202/644