Sand Control
The installation of equipment or application of techniques to prevent migration of reservoir sand into the wellbore or near-wellbore area is called sand control. In weak formations, sand control may be necessary to maintain the structure of the reservoir around the wellbore. In other formation types, the migration of sand and fines into the near wellbore area may severely restrict production. Each of these conditions requires different treatments. The principal sand-control techniques include gravel packing and sand consolidation.
as reservoir rocks go, porous and permeable sand formations filled with large volumes of hydrocarbons that flow easily into an oilwell are every petroleum engineer’s dream. But when that sand formation turns out to be so poorly cemented together that sand grains flow into the well along with the oil, that dream can sometimes become a nightmare. Sand can damage equipment such as valves, pipelines and separators, it can cause poor performance in injection wells, and can lead to lost production.
‘Producing hydrocarbons from sand prone reservoirs can present some difficult challenges,’ says Chris Lockyear, director of BP’s Beyond Sand Control (BSC) programme within the company’s exploration and production business. ‘And these are challenges engineers will have to tackle more and more often in the future.’
Just a few years ago around a quarter to a third of BP’s reservoirs were affected by sand. But by the end of the decade nearly half of the company’s reservoirs are expected to be sand-prone. Adding to this challenge, virtually all of these will be offshore, and many will be in deeper water – an environment where intervention to solve problems is more expensive and difficult.
NoDoC simulstes the cost of various methods applying for sand control in oil & gas drilling projects.
as reservoir rocks go, porous and permeable sand formations filled with large volumes of hydrocarbons that flow easily into an oilwell are every petroleum engineer’s dream. But when that sand formation turns out to be so poorly cemented together that sand grains flow into the well along with the oil, that dream can sometimes become a nightmare. Sand can damage equipment such as valves, pipelines and separators, it can cause poor performance in injection wells, and can lead to lost production.
‘Producing hydrocarbons from sand prone reservoirs can present some difficult challenges,’ says Chris Lockyear, director of BP’s Beyond Sand Control (BSC) programme within the company’s exploration and production business. ‘And these are challenges engineers will have to tackle more and more often in the future.’
Just a few years ago around a quarter to a third of BP’s reservoirs were affected by sand. But by the end of the decade nearly half of the company’s reservoirs are expected to be sand-prone. Adding to this challenge, virtually all of these will be offshore, and many will be in deeper water – an environment where intervention to solve problems is more expensive and difficult.
NoDoC simulstes the cost of various methods applying for sand control in oil & gas drilling projects.
