New well design software
The new ERDesigner well construction guidance system provides procedures and tools needed to implement extended reach well designs.
The software technology accommodates deviated, extended reach, horizontal, and deepwater deviated wells.
The system's multitiered architecture logically progresses from feasibility to well design and implementation.
ERDesigner also combines this firm's torque and drag software with its other engineering tools, including the Well Cost Model, the ERD Difficulty Index, the Probabilistic Cost Model, and Drilling Design and Implementation for Extended Reach and Complex Wells.
The first and most basic level of ERDesigner calculates time, cost, and feasibility to drill an extended reach well. Engineers can assess the geometrical and well path complexity and determine the economics of entering into an extended reach drilling project. The program computes data entered about the well and rig types and the drilling environment. It also will generate drilling time and cost estimates for a given well path and casing program.
An offset well review (OWR) process built into the second tier provides data from past wells that may apply to the engineering of the well in question. This section provides the overall framework for an OWR, beginning with a selection process to determine which wells are pertinent to the forthcoming drilling program. After review, the system will perform offset modeling evaluations that are then used to begin an OWR report. Templates and checklists help ensure that each critical point in the process is addressed.
The detailed well design module serves as the basis for the drilling program. The software copies and plots geology and fracture gradients and then creates a well path and casing hole program. The system calculates torque and drag values, critical buckling, and drilling string and annular hydraulics.
Based on weight and flow parameters, ERDesigner will analyze rig type and power and calculate the rig's required capacity. The final step in the software's systematic approach yields operational guidelines for implementing the drilling program.
Source: K&M Technology Group, 26110 Oak Ridge Drive, The Woodlands, TX 77380.
Free brochure features new fire safe valve actuator
The new Factory Mutual Approved Watchdog fire safe valve actuator is featured in a new brochure, offered free upon request.
This fusible link shutoff valve actuator is a self-contained, spring loaded device that automatically shuts off or opens 1/4 through 4 in. fire safe ball valves to contain spreading of flammable or toxic materials.
It's available with heat activated thermal links or ETL links (heat and-or electrically activated) elements. The units can also be manually operated as standard fire safe valves.
Source: Essex Fluid Controls, 7700 Gravois Ave., St. Louis, MO 63123-4728.
Free online handbook updates drilling, completion data
An updated field data handbook for cementing, stimulation, and coiled tubing is available as a desktop application. The new online version, called the i-Handbook, is available for download at no cost at http://www.slb.com/oilfield/ihandbook/.
It features six sections:
General information, which contains conversion factors, formulas, tank and drum capacity tables and calculator, mud pump displacement-animator and calculator, and data on API flanges, rings, and gaskets.
Coiled tubing and pipe data, which include mechanical properties for API standard and non-API tubulars like tubing, casing, drill pipe, and coiled tubing, drill bit clearances in casings.
Volume, which features dimensions and capacities for open hole, tubing, drill pipe, and casing, annular volume for various combinations of open hole and tubulars, drill pipe tool joint displacement.
Fracturing, which includes formulas and treatment-related calculators, carbon dioxide, and nitrogen data.
Cementing, which lists physical properties of cement slurries along with several calculators.
Acid, oil, and brine, which contains acid and brine tables with calculators.
Other features include calculators to help with multiple well operations such as drilling and workover, cementing, fracturing, and general unit conversions; a library of predefined wellbore diagrams; and copy and paste options for exporting handbook data to software applications.
Source: Schlumberger Oilfield Services, 300 Schlumberger Drive, Sugar Land, TX 77478.
New technology designed to boost gasoline yield
The new ERDesigner well construction guidance system provides procedures and tools needed to implement extended reach well designs. Flex-Tec catalyst helps increase the amount of gasoline produced from resid feedstocks, even highly contaminated ones, the company says. It incorporates this firm's MaxiMet technology to passivate metals, such as nickel and vanadium, even when processing highly contaminated resid feeds.
In one US refinery trial, Flex-Tec produced 3,000 b/d more gasoline than the previous catalyst and reduced the yield of undesirable heavy fuel oil by nearly 2,000 b/d, the company notes.
Source: Engelhard Corp., Box 770, Iselin, NJ 08830.
