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SECTION HEADING

Offshore Drilling Analysis Solutions -Directional Drilling, Drillstring Mechanicsand Fatigue Analysis Services and Software

Stphane Menand & Ludovic Macresy, DrillScan

OFFSHORE TECHNOLOGY INTERNATIONAL1

NTRODUCTION

DrillScan is a French company thatprovides services and software to

the drilling industry. Its expertise isbased on the results of 30 yearsresearch carried out at the MinesParisTech university, and largelaboratory and field validations incollaboration with operators. Thanks toits high quality and advanced modellingsoftware, BHA Management (seefigure 1), its highly skilled team andclose collaborations with Total, DrillScanprovides solutions in the field ofdirectional drilling, torque and drag,buckling, drilling bit performances,dynamics and wellbore placement. Theaim of this technical paper is to presentthe sophisticated modelling andmethods of software of BHAManagement, and some fieldapplications that have led to improveddrilling performance. In this paper, onewill focus mainly on drilling mechanics,and more specifically on directionaldrilling, drill string mechanics andfatigue issues in offshore environments.

OFFSHORE DRILLINGEven though offshore drilling

techniques are generally similar tothose onshore, drilling an offshore wellis always very challenging, and more

difficult than an onshore well. Thiscomplexity comes obviously from therig platform structure itself, but is alsodue to the very challenging well pathsrequired to hit multiple targets. Indeed,

because of the complex and deep welltrajectory, offshore equipment andtechnology must be adapted to meetthis harsh, high-cost environment. As aconsequence, drilling complex offshorewells requires accurate andsophisticated predictive modelling, toreduce risks and lower drilling costs.

DIRECTIONAL DRILLINGThe oil and gas industry relies greatly

on directional drilling to developpetroleum reserves in high-costsenvironments such as deepwater

offshore. To address directionalperformance issues in these complexwells (3D, Extended Reach Drilling, HighPressure / High Temperature Wells,Ultra Deep Water), Bottom Hole

Assemblies (BHAs) become morecomplex and sophisticated. To be ableto accurately predict the directionalbehaviour of these complex BHAs, suchas rotary BHA, Rotary Steerable System(RSS) or Steerable Motor (SM), thedrilling engineer needs modernsoftware that should have the followingrequirements:

Pre-engineering and post-analysismodule

Powerful 3D BHA-Drillstring / Holeinteraction model

I

BHA-DrillString/Hole

contact points, are

fully assessed by themodel, using a

powerful iterative

process

Figure 1: BHA Managementsoftware platform offers high-quality modelling

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