Orphan Wells Plug and Abandonment
There are currently 3.2 million orphaned oil and gas wells in the United States. Many of which are not properly plugged and abandoned. More wells enter the abandoned wells pool every year, and as they degrade operators face an upcoming “P&A wave” of wells that need to be permanently and properly plugged and abandoned.
| Reasons for Well P&A |
|---|
| Lack of well delivery — The well is no longer productive |
| Well problems — Making it not economical for recompletion or doing a workover |
| Environmental concerns — Cleaning up the area and not wanting to operate in certain places |
| Structural issues — Due to age or hurricane damage. |
| Common Issues with Abandoned Wells |
|---|
| Conduit to subsurface aquifers |
| Contamination of groundwater |
| Emits volatile hydrocarbons or other compounds |
| Missing or inaccurate records |
Well control company-assisted well integrity programs can make a huge difference in helping the customer avoid needless problems and expenses when P&As are needed. The idea is to help customers substantially reduce risk by involving a well control company in the planning stages of a P&A, so customers are aware of their vulnerabilities before beginning operations.
Operators are in the business of drilling and producing, not plug and abandoning. Typically, operators do not have the manpower or resources required to perform a P&A—especially one with issues—and don’t have the staff to dedicate to P&A. It’s also important for customers to have all the products, services, and technology to meet the complete needs of a P&A.
Rigging up a pneumatic casing cutter to cut and prepare casing for re-heading.
For example, our bundled services from cementing to coil, to downhole tools, engineers, flowback tanks, hot tap, valve drilling, freeze services, etc., fill the gaps of traditional service companies to perform a P&A, Fig. 4. There is one contact that makes it easier for customers to handle the project from start to finish. The fewer contracts that customers must deal with is smart for both financial and efficiency reasons. They don’t have to worry about the liabilities of using 10 different companies, 10 different insurances, 10 different safety cultures, and 10 different pricing practices. Instead, they have one provider to meet their complete P&A needs with the products, services and technology required to be prepared for the unexpected.
Ensuring Well Integrity with Technology
Tapping, using a hot-tap unit to check for trapped pressure.
The detailed operations required in a P&A can vary significantly from well to well, depending on the type of well and the actual well conditions. A critical part of P&A is assessing well integrity prior to an abandonment. Technology plays a major role in this. For example, we have a mobile Wellhead Audit application that inspects wellheads and identifies in minutes which wells need immediate attention and which wells are of minimal or moderate risk. This is a highly efficient way for customers to know whether their assets present risk and take steps to rectify the issue before the risk becomes an unwanted issue that can escalate. Technologically advanced hot tap, valve drilling units and freezes may be a key to the P&A preparation process, depending on the well, Fig. 5. Today’s valve drilling machines are lighter and more efficient than previously available. Freezes are now being performed with field people. These folks are engineers that continually improve technologies and are coming with solutions to handle congested well bays, and lack of horizontal and vertical access on offshore structures.
In the area of hot taps, Cudd Well Control has developed a new ultra-compact Hot Tap that is less than 10% the weight of conventional equipment, and the only hot tap on the market rated API 6A 3G. This highly safe technology, used to check pressures, offers a compact design that makes it easy to transport and easy to use by one worker.
Stepping Up to the Challenge Together
Plugging and abandoning the scores of orphaned oil and gas wells presents an opportunity to mitigate problems and potential risks, and provide an economic boost to the experts that specialize in this area. Employment gains from plugging wells could help offset job losses from the oil and gas industry, which lost tens of thousands of jobs during the Covid-19 pandemic. While there is much work still to be done on the issue, a concerted effort by the Well Control community is a promising step to meeting the environmental and economic goals of customers around the world.