Geomechanics for borehole stability plays an important role in drilling operations to avoid or minimize NPT events such as differential stuck pipe or pack-off and drilling fluid losses. It is important to have a borehole stability model in the planning process, but it is equally important to monitor and calibrate the geomechanical model during drilling operations. This paper presents the development of a series of computational tools along with a methodology for real-time geomechanical monitoring of wellbore stability during drilling operations.
Ecopetrol developed a software called EcoAge, geomechanical modeling software. EcoAge integrates a series of modules for the visualization of operations and drilling parameters in real time, using standard connection protocols in the industry to receive and send information from drilling rigs to remote monitoring rooms and vice versa. EcoAge includes modules for hydraulic, swabbing and surging simulations to integrate information of drilling operations and borehole stability monitoring in real time at the office.
The monitoring was carried out from the RTOC laboratory of the Colombian Petroleum Institute in 28 exploratory and development wells in Castilla, Chichimene and CPO-09 fields between August 2017 and August 2018, making it possible to demonstrate the risks of geomechanics and wellbore instability in real time, communicating and interacting with the leaders and technical authorities.
This geomechanical monitoring contributed to the reduction of NPT in Chichimene and Castilla fields from 24% to 10.7%, approximate 0.9 days of operations time and lower NPT in the exploratory wells in order to 14%. A geomechanical model in real-time was built in exploratory wells with information of LWD. EcoAge is owned by Ecopetrol and this software integrates and displays information from multiple areas of Ecopetrol in a single software tool.
