In year 2000, Sonatrach, the national Algerian Oil & Gas operator adopted its HSE policy that explained Sonatrach's vision, objectives and plans to ensure its compliance with the environmental laws in place including what relates to the Drilling Operations.
As a result, the Drilling Division in Sonatrach designed its own strategy and plans to deal with the cuttings drilled and fluid waste generated from the drilling operation on all drilling areas in Algeria.
Since the generated wastes in onshore drilling may lead to serious contamination of the surrounding land marine, surface water bodies, ground water aquifers and in certain cases may cause harmful effect on any animal or human life exposed to such waste.
In dealing with such serious issue, Sonatrach Drilling Division made its segmentation between old wastes subject to treatment only or fresh waste generated by the ongoing drilling operations either in the green areas in the North/the desert zones in the South. Other factors were using which type of Drilling Fluids (Oil or Water based) and the volume of cuttings generated either big from development operation or small from remote exploratory wells.
After reaching the well-defined strategy, Sontrach Drilling Division applied the general DWM concepts in a customized approach to manage each case optimally.
In this presentation Sonatrach Drilling Division will present the strategy, the concepts, the modules and the plans it followed in managing this critical issue, then, it will show how it materialized such strategy on the ground through presenting its experience and achievements along the last 10 years.
