One of the major operation challenges in the E&P industries are stuck pipe incidents which usually lead to a considerable amount of lost time and associated costs. The increases in drilling activity, drilling in depleted and higher risk reservoirs leads to an increased risk of stuck pipe.
As we can observe in this case for this NOC, the greatest impact is when the drilling performance is Non-Productive Time (NPT). We know that around 25% of the NPT is regarded to stuck pipe and this can be translated to the cost of almost 2 rig-years every year. An analysis of the stuck pipe incidents revealed that the major causes of stuck pipe incidents are mechanical (bridging/pack-off) and differential sticking. If we want to prevent and avoid …show more content…
• Use of Economics of fishing vs side track scenarios using mathematical models for effective decision making.
• Create awareness of stuck pipe incidents with posters and certification courses. Posters will be displayed to serve as a reminder the drilling personnel.
• Stuck pipe training will be offered to all frontline drilling personnel with potential. or 2 years’ certification. This way, we will be able to engage with the current offshore team offering to them this unique certification.
• Introduction of a Stuck Pipe Reporting Template which will provide a consistent platform to analyse stuck pipe incidents thoroughly and
• Highlighting effective measures for reducing associated NPT. It is highly recommended to implement a drilling database to capture all incidents.
• Short and long term stuck pipe avoidance initiatives have to be discussed by the team for either developing and/or acquiring stuck pipe.
• avoidance software for alert/prevention and to be incorporated to the Real Time Operating Centre (RTOC) as a long-term action.
Best Practices for Stuck Pipe …show more content…
A reduction can be in place by displacing the well to a lighter mud ergo the analysis has to be repeated considering the new Specific Gravity (s.g.) of the mud, obtaining a new differential pressure and buoyancy.
Using the values obtained in Equation 1 we will get the surface force which can be below or above the pipe strength. Equation 2 will provide the torque which also can be below of above the torque limit. We must consider that these two values must be always be below their limits, said this, we can conclude that displacing the well to a lighter mud is the best measure to free the drillstring. The buoyancy will decrease, but this effect is negligible to the effect of reducing the bottomhole pressure.
Maximum Buoyancy Method
The previous method analysed is to displace the inside of the drillpipe to seawater to increase buoyancy. This is allowed providing that well control is maintained as the seawater pill later is displaced up the annulus. For instance, let’s say that we have an initial mud of 1.65 s.g. in the annulus which results in an initial differential pressure of 188 bar. The buoyancy increases and is given by the following