Gardes Directional Drilling, Lafayette, La., has signed a multimillion dollar contract to develop two Russian oil fields with horizontal and radial drilling technology.
The joint venture contract was signed with Orenburgneft and the Orenburg Region in the Russian republic.
The contract provides for development of Vorontsovskoe and Rodinskoe fields, which are in the Vogal-Ural Mountain area north of the Caspian Sea.
Gardes said estimated reserves exceed 290 million bbl of oil in the two fields.
The first phase of the contract is to design and engineer well plans from existing Geophysical data.
Gardes has developed a patented radial drilling method that allows many radial offshoots to be drilled from one horizontal wellbore. The company said the technology works well for enhanced oil recovery projects, such as for heavy oil, and for projects in which there are potential environmental effects.
Vorontsovskoe field lies in the middle of a national park, and previous drilling there had been suspended because of environmental harm, Gardes said.
Gardes Pres. Bob Gardes said radial drilling takes horizontal drilling one step further.
"We have married the technology of oil mining with horizontal drilling.
"The Russians have been using oil mining for years in Yarega field for gravity drainage. They go underneath the formation and then drill radials up into the formation and gravity drain the oil.
"The difference is the Russians dig man-sized tunnels. We drill 7 7/8 in. horizontal wellbores."
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