Gazprom Neft subsidiary Gazpromneft-Yamal LLC completed Russia’s first multilateral well with four horizontal cased-hole sidetracks at Novoportovskoye oil, gas, and condensate field.
Operator Gazpromneft-Yamal drilled a total 6,756 m of which 4,411 m was in the target zone. Crews completed the well in 39 days at a rate of 5.78 days/1,000 m.
The horizontal sections increased drainage from disjointed low-permeability areas, increasing oil recovery and bringing marginal reserves into development without the need to drill additional wells.
Novoportovskoye field is the largest oil field on the Yamal Peninsula. It was discovered during the 1960s but development was delayed by absence of transport infrastructure and complex geology.
Although 117 exploratory wells were drilled by 1987, proactive development did not begin until after 2010 when Gazprom transferred the field to Gazprom Neft.
