Oil Well NEWS

Congressional Democrats this week urged the Environmental Projection Agency to strengthen its proposal to regulate planet-warming methane gas emissions from the country’s oil and gas sector.

U.S. shale oil producers are returning to existing wells and giving them a second, high-pressure blast to lift output for a fraction of the cost of a finishing a new well. These "re-fracs" are taking hold as shale oil producers look to take advantage of $100 a barrel crude without making big investments in new wells and fields. A global oil shortage has triggered calls from U.S. President Joe Biden for shale producers to spend more of their profits on increasing output. But shale firms have been under pressure for years from shareholders to focus on returns rather than production growth. Their reluctance to invest in more output has led to tensions between the oil industry and the White House, which is under pressure to rein in record $5 per gallon fuel prices that have contributed to decades-high inflation.

The new technology - Managed Pressure Drilling (MPD) proved to be beneficial in the state because conventional drilling could not be used in these geographical locations.

The United States Department of Interior (“DOI”) announced that $1.15 billion is available to the states from the recently enacted Infrastructure Law for remediating orphaned oil and gas wells.

The Railroad Commission of Texas issued a total of 732 original drilling permits in April 2021 compared to 456 in April 2020. The April 2021 total includes 629 permits to drill new oil or gas wells, five to re-enter plugged well bores, and 94 for re-completions of existing well bores. The breakdown of well types for original drilling permits in April 2021 is 205 oil, 63 gas, 434 oil or gas, 22 injection, and eight other permits.

The billionaire’s SpaceX intends to drill wells close to company’s Boca Chica launchpad. Production has yet to start because of legal dispute between SpaceX subsidiary Lone Star Mineral Development and another energy company. While it’s unclear what exactly the gas would be used for, SpaceX plans to utilize super-chilled liquid methane and liquid oxygen as fuel for its Raptor engines.

The report of the expert panel constituted to look into the Baghjan oil well blowout has uncovered major lapses by Oil India Ltd including lack of planning, execution and supervision of critical operations. They did not even have the mandatory consent to operate and establish drilling operations. There were serious deficiencies of proper supervision of critical operation at the well site both from the contractor as well as from Oil India Ltd.

Initial tests on Shpirag 4 well of Shell in central Albania showed "a flow potential of several thousand barrels of oil per day". Shell has informed that it is yet to determine the commercial volume of the well. Shell's Executive VP of exploration said, "We are pleased that these initial tests have confirmed the potential of this discovery and look forward to growing our business in Albania".

Awilco Drilling is a Westhill-based firm which has been awarded contract extension with Shell. The company has been rewarded decommissioning contract extension and now will also be covering the abandonment of five further wells. This contract is valid until Q1 2020. The initial contract for the WilPhoenix rig was for 18 wells and was expected to be worth £30 million.

US' Talos Energy has successfully completed drill stem test (DST) of the Zama-2 side-track well (Zama-2 ST1) in Block 7, Mexico. Talos has 35% operating interest in Block 7 and the rest are held by Premier Oil (25%) and Sierra Oil and Gas (40%). During the DST operation, a combined flow rate of 7,426 barrels of oil per day was achieved from two separate tests.

The National Oil Corporation (NOC) of Libya has announced that output at the Abu Attifel field has increased. The operator of Abu Attifel, Mellitah Oil and Gas is in charge of enhancement and maintenance work at the field and has increased the condensate production by 2,000 bpd to 9,500 bpd. The company informed that depending on the work, a further increase at other wells too is expected.

UK’s oil and gas firm, Angus Energy has informed that the seven day flow test has been completed at the Balcombe exploration site. The company wants to “establish commercial production” from Balcombe-2z horizontal well. According to the firm’s prediction, initially 3,000 bpd can be extracted from the site. MD of Angus said “We are obviously pleased with the results of the Balcombe-2z flow test”.

The increasing drilling activities need operators to be accurate and efficient in one run. Halliburton has made the task easy for the operators by releasing the iCruise Intelligent Rotary Steerable System (RSS). This revolutionary technology will provide accurate steering, longer laterals and quicker drilling facilities. V.P of Sperry Drilling expressed said that RSS has advance sensors and electronics including high speed processors that can give accurate end results.

During the drilling process of a long horizontal well that has multi-stage completions, various challenges are being faced due to restricted centralization and casing movement. At SPE ATCE, Schlumberger launched the CemFIT Shield mud-sealing cement system to counter this problem. The CemFIT Shield will be the first in line of technologies dedicated to improving zonal isolation, especially between hydraulic fracturing stages in long horizontal wells.

Norway’s energy major, Equinor Energy AS has been granted a drilling permit for a well by the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate. Well 6407/11-1 of Resource Management Regulations will be drilled from the drilling facility of the Deepsea Bergen. This will be the first well to be built under the production license 751 which was awarded on Feb. 7, 2014. Equinor will be the operator having 80% of the ownership interest.

Russian oil and gas supermajor, Rosneft, has kicked off drilling operations offshore Vietnam. To develop the Lan Do field further, Rosneft plans to construct subsea installations to be linked with Lan Tay platform in the block. Rosneft is viewing its operations in Vietnam as the experience required to expand its global reach. The company has made this move amidst sanctions preventing it from offshore mining with western companies.

Yet another bold statement and prediction by Arthur Berman, former geologist and now an industry consultant who earned the wrath of Shale drillers by forecasting that natural gas is about to run out now says “Permian region of Texas and New Mexico won’t last for long.” Berman’s grim outlook is supported by analyses of reserves and production data from more than a dozen prominent shale drillers.

Drilling of first exploration well in a four-well campaign in the Echo Energy plc’s Fracción C asset, onshore Argentina has commenced. The Company will update shareholders with progress on both the exploration drilling program and extended testing as the program advances.