Smart Product to Cure Fluid Losses in Drilling Operations

Abstract The project aims to develop a smart product for losses, different from the traditional approach, to control partial and total fluid losses in drilling operations. The developed smart product for losses is customized to reduce the non-productive time (NPT) and to improve the operation efficiency in compliance with oilfield safety requirements and industry standards. This smart product for losses was engineered and validated both by operator and chemical provider partner's research technology laboratories, in order to verify the applicability range in water base mud (WBM) and oil base mud (OBM) environmental. The smart product for losses is a bi-component fluid mixture, consisting of two parts: monomers blend and activator. These monomers and activator mixture show water-like rheological properties and are capable of becoming a stiff solid after a reaction activated by the temperature. The activation temperature can be regulated based on single application needs. This smart product for losses is pumpable throughout the drill string safely and becomes quickly a stiff solid when in contact with the formation temperature, creating a solid barrier in the well with consequent stop of drilling fluid losses. The bi-component system has been designed with a series of laboratory tests to find the best mixture of monomers and activator. Once the formulation has been fixed, prior to moving on first field trial, confirmatory test campaign has been performed to ensure the proper functioning at the candidate well environmental condition. The first field trial was done in a depleted well ready for Plug & Abandonment, to verify fluid mixability and pumpability with conventional oilfield equipment in a real-life scale and verify proper product setting at well condition. All achievements for the test were satisfying and allowed the project to move to the next step, a test on a well with high probability to face out of total losses scenario during drilling operations. With this second test, the objective was to confirm the reliability of the bi-component system in a loss scenario during the drilling operation. Similar to the first field test, this test while drilling also achieved good results with the confirmation of capability of smart product for losses to properly setting on a open hole well bore condition, confirming the smart product's consistency.