“I learned the ropes of directional drilling in Siberia,” says Airat when we meet on Teams. He calls in from his home in Saudi Arabia, where he now works as an operations geologist for Aramco.
“In 2007, directional drilling was still something we did on paper,” he says. “Then we started using Excel to speed up the process, and ultimately I was involved in writing dedicated software to make the process more user-friendly. In that sense, we have come a long way.”
But at the same time, the challenges are still very similar to what they were almost 20 years ago; making sure that the bit stays not only in the reservoir, but also in the hydrocarbon-bearing interval and preferably as far away from the contact to prevent early water breakthrough.
“The other challenge we always face is the scrutiny of costs,” continues Airat. ”The more tools in the BHA, the higher the cost of the well. My favourite logging suite is the triple combo, having the gamma-ray, density and borehole images at my disposal. But there is always the pressure to drill cheaper and reduce the tool suite, to a point where we may even drill on drilling parameters alone in some cases.”
Combining these things with the pressure to maintain as high an ROP as possible to reduce rig time, it is clear that operations geologists are always under lots of pressure to deliver the best geosteering results. And the number of these geosteered wells is ever increasing.
Do you want to take up the challenge and compete with geosteering experts around the world? Sign up for ROGII’s Geosteering World Cup, taking place on the 16th of September
More challenging reservoirs
The world is turning to produce hydrocarbons from more challenging reservoirs, prompting operators to focus on thinner and more complex reservoirs. From an unconventional perspective, companies are increasingly moving to produce from sweet spots in tight rocks where long horizontals are required to achieve economic flow rates. In both cases, geosteering is an essential part of the drilling process, and it is therefore easy to see how the profession has increased in importance over the past 20 years.
Testing your skills
Given the picture painted above, it may not be too much of a surprise to see that the Geosteering World Cup organised by ROGII since 2018 has been attracting ever-increasing numbers of participants, with more than 400 geologists taking part last year. During two sessions of 45 minutes each, the participants are drilling a directional conventional and unconventional well.
“At first glance, it may seem easy,” says Airat, who won the competition last year. “In my day-job, I often manage 6 to 7 wells at the same time. During the competition, you’re only focused on drilling one well.”
“But the most challenging element is the time constraints you are under,” Airat says. “In two minutes, we have to make a call on whether to change direction or not, make sure which dip to go for, and, last but not least, make sure to enter your data in time because the system will need a few seconds to make the adjustments before time runs out.”
“I can therefore recommend to those who participate this year to time their two minutes accurately,” says Airat. “It prevented any mishaps in my case, and if you’d like to win, you can’t afford any, because the margins between the winner and the rest of the top ten are really slim!”
