Project showcase

Blowout scenario simulations and contingency study

Project goal

To comply with the company's safety guidelines and policy, a blowout contingency study was required to assure the well could be killed via a single relief well in the event on an uncontrolled hydrocarbon release

Asset:

Offshore shallow gas well

Location:

Norway

A blowout intervention for an offshore shallow gas well is often faced with many challenges such as the narrow depth window to build hydrostatic and frictional pressure during a dynamic kill combined with high pressure differential to balance the reservoir pressure.

For a worst-case blowout scenario, using a relief well injection spool (RWIS) can ensure the ability to bring such wells under control.

AE photo RWIS 002

What we did

Our well-control and flow-simulation specialists modeled the worst-case-blowout scenario using the planned wellbore schematic and predicted reservoir properties.

A single relief well with an RWIS installed on its wellhead was used in the simulations to pump kill mud into the target wellbore. Several iterations were made using different kill muds and hardware configurations to achieve a successful kill.

The results

  • A worst-case gas discharge of around 3 Billion SCF/Day
  • A dynamic kill using the RWIS to pump a heavy mud at a combined rate of 230 bpm - 50 bpm down primary relief well and 180 bpm down secondary relief well connected to the RWIS
  • Hardware configuration was evaluated for hhp requirements, pump curves, pressure ratings, erosional velocities, fatigue limitations, system redundancy and other constraints
  • The study demonstrated that a prolific worst-case blowout scenario could in this case be killed with a single relief well

Learn more about The Relief Well Injection Spool (RWIS)

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