American Oil and Gas Reporter - November 2017 - 58

SpecialReport: Oil & Gas Computing

The newest generation of transload facilities are designed to have the ﬂexibility to accommodate large orders on short notice, with the proppant selection, storage volume
and delivery mechanisms to allow just-in-time inventory management to quickly react
to unplanned changes in treatment designs. Built-in quality control measures such as
scannable rail car tags and SCADA system lockouts prevent cross-contamination of different proppant types and gain sizes.

longer to get equipment and supplies to
the rig, especially during winter."
Batch techniques have paid huge dividends in enhancing drilling efficiency
in resource plays, but Pilcher points out
that they also help streamline drilling logistics by repeating operations using common fluid systems, cements, pipe, downhole tools, etc. "In the D-J Basin, we estimate that batch drilling techniques save
20 percent of the cost of each well. If
you batch drill five wells, the sixth one
on a pad is basically free," he notes.
It takes only a couple hours for a rig
to skid between Niobrara/Codell wells
on 15-foot centers, according to Pilcher.
"We can drill a surface section to 1,600
feet, and run and cement casing every 16
hours, on average. If we have 10 wells
on a pad, we drill all 10 surface sections
using the same mud and bottom-hole assembly," he outlines. "Once the last
surface section is drilled, the mud and
BHA systems are switched to start drilling
the lateral sections and the rig begins
working its way the other direction. Not
having to change muds or BHAs each
time the rig starts a new well has a huge
impact on logistics."
With batch drilling keeping crews hopping 24 hours a day, Pilcher says IPT
maintains two company hands on site,
each taking a turn in 12-hour shifts.
58 THE AMERICAN OIL & GAS REPORTER

"Everything happens so quickly and there
is so much going on at any time that it is
impossible for one guy to handle it," he
allows. "Drilling is an around-the-clock
operation, which means everything associated with the rig also has to run 24/7."
That includes logistics. To eliminate
operational issues and supply chain choke
points, Pilcher says IPT encourages operators to conduct detailed prespud meetings with all parties involved in a drilling
operation on the first well on a pad, going
through the well plan step by step.
"A 'drill-the-well-on-paper' exercise
brings everyone together, from the driller
to the cementer and well logger, and
sometimes even the company housing
the crews," he details. "We make sure
everyone who will be interacting on location during each step is on the same
page and understands what is expected
and when."
Completion Quality
The mantra "more is better" has come
to define the completion operation-more
stages, more proppant, more fluid, more
horsepower, etc. With pad frac operations
occurring concurrently, the combination
of larger job sizes and simultaneous workflows is putting even greater stress on
what already was the most daunting aspect
of managing oil and gas logistics, ac-

cording to Poulson. "It is just getting
more and more complicated," he observes.
At the same time, the push to reduce
break-even costs in tight oil and gas shale
plays has put economic pressure on all
aspects of well construction, including
completion engineering. "With low commodity prices, the thought process of
how to best engineer a completion has
been driven more by what can save money
than by what can make a better well," he
remarks. "The focus has been on completion quantity and how fast you can
put sand down the hole. We are starting
to see clients shift focus more to completion quality."
Given the high degree of variability
across shale basins, what works in one
well may lead to subpar performance in
an offset. "The way to maximize productivity and recoveries is to understand
how the rock is fracturing along the
lateral, and how completion engineering
can be optimized in real time based on
that information," Poulson holds. "The
key is real-time operational analysis for
quality assurance and quality control."
Real-time optimization means different
things to different disciplines. In drilling,
real-time analysis may be geosteering to
keep the BHA in the target zone. But,
Pilcher points out, the types of adjustments
made to the drilling plan while the bit is
turning-i.e., changing inclination or adding
mud weight-usually have little immediate
impact on the logistics network supporting
a field campaign.
On the other hand, Poulson says, adjusting a completion design midstream
may mean mobilizing the cavalry to swap
out millions of pounds of proppant or
thousands of barrels of frac fluid. "Logistics issues should never trump the engineering issues," he contends. "We are
not on location to empty the sand can.
We are there to maximize well production
and to ensure the treatment is performed
and invoiced correctly."
According to Poulson, small companies
tend to be the most enthusiastic adopters
of real-time completion analysis. "These
companies cannot afford subpar wells.
They are buying small leaseholds and
using the best completion engineering
they can get their hands on to get the
most from each well they invest in. Utilizing consulting specialists gets the
smaller companies the best engineering
without having the overhead of large
staffs," he states.

American Oil and Gas Reporter - November 2017

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