Last year, CNR took a bold step in the North Sea by deciding to team with Schlumberger to remote manage the drilling of a well sidetrack in its quest to sustain production from the ageing Murchison field.
One core objective was to demonstrate that this was potentially a more effective way of using valuable people resources for MWD (measurement while drilling) operations for smaller North Sea operators, bearing in mind that Schlumberger has been building a track record of working this way with three majors across some 30 platforms – StatoilHydro since 2005, plus BP and Shell.
The Murchison success has prompted CNR to consider this approach in the future, both for Murchison again and for its multi-platform Ninian field asset, where there remains significant potential to recover further reserves from this former oil giant. A well is planned for 2009.
Katy Heidenreich, North Sea real-time business development manager at Schlumberger, told Energy that remote MWD operations offered several benefits, not least contributing to enhanced safety and easing pressure on offshore bed space and scarce seats in helicopters.
“It helps to improve health and safety as older North Sea platforms – and there are many – have increasingly frequent maintenance schedules and so bed space is quite a problem. Instead of sending teams offshore, remote services can provide a solution to that problem,” said Heidenreich.
“Other benefits come from that as, when engineers are sat together at our Aberdeen operations support centre (formally opened in November, 2008), they are working in an environment where other experts are co-located with them.”
She explained that, for remote MWD, the company provides 24/7 cover from the centre, so mirroring the 12-hour shifts offshore, based on two professionals – a directional driller and a logging-while-drilling engineer.
“Often challenging is helicopter space. We’re competing with core platform crew. We typically move our drilling guys from rig to rig, so they never stay on a platform more than 9-10 months and then they’ll move on.”
Heidenreich said that, in the case of Murchison, it was an overhaul of the field’s connectivity that opened the door to considering remote MWD for the then planned 2008 well.
CNR had decided to invest in replacing existing platform-to-shore communications with a fibre-optic link, and that meant greater bandwidth availability.
CNR senior well engineer Kevin Stillwell said: “Originally, we had a limited bandwidth to Murchison so we had never particularly considered anything that was going to take up more of that bandwidth.
“We then had a fibre-optic link trial early-2008. That led to the question: what can we do with it? One suggestion was using remote operations for a well we were planning.
“Because we get the Schlumberger guys ad hoc, we struggle to secure helicopter space, and when we get it, typically it’s the start or end of a week. Even if we don’t need the guys until Friday, we may have to bring then out on the Monday just because you can’t get seats on the Tuesday or Wednesday. There’s always the threat of weather, too, as it delays the helicopters.
“So going for remote MWD was a neat solution to a lot of problems.”
What about the well itself?
Basically, it was a sidetrack of an earlier dry hole.
Stillwell: “Most of the well already existed … we drilled a sidetrack (well number 78z). It was a 50-day well … drilling and completion.”
He said that, traditionally, Murchison had worked with a drilling crew of five, though this had been reduced to four through agreement with Schlumberger. The platform’s drill floor is regarded as fairly original, though it has been fitted with some manual handling saving devices.
“What we did was, because there was a bit of nervousness about taking the engineers away from offshore and controlling from onshore, we actually sat the remote up onshore but had the guys offshore at the start.
“They were essentially told hands off. Pretend you’re not there.
“We did that for a couple of days, then we down-manned one … kept the other on for helping to handle the tools.”
Heidenreich added: “Basically, the key thing that has to be overcome when introducing a service like that is the interface between the rig crew, which is used to working in a particular way with a Schlumberger crew when offshore.
“So the first thing we did (with Murchison) was not to change too many things at once and shock the system.
“We had the two guys onshore working night and day and kept the crew offshore for a couple of days. After the weekend, we got feedback from the driller, directional driller and everybody relevant and confirmed that they were happy with the operation. Then we could down-man.”
For Heidenreich, remote MWD on platforms is the first step in the journey towards extensive remote management.
“We’re moving towards remote logging and remote directional drilling services and the technology is now there to do that now.
“But you’re taking key members of an important team … removing them from the rig … and you have to make sure you do it in the right way … not introducing risk and impacting the decision-making offshore. It will be a journey.”