A Case Study of Sustained Annulus Pressure Diagnosis in a Newly Drilled High-Pressure Gas Well in SPDC

Well integrity is a key focus area in any oil and gas development. There have been several cases of well integrity issues which have resulted in scenarios of blowout, loss of lives, assets, and reputation, including costs spent for clean-up and environmental remediation, amongst others. These and more have made the energy industry put a keen focus to making sure all hydrocarbon production and processing facilities are integral, with newer technologies still being developed to aid the diagnosis of well integrity problems.

Well integrity considerations cut across the entire life cycle of the well, from well conceptualization/planning through to drilling, completion, production and abandonment. This case study presents a high-pressure, high temperature gas well with sustained annulus pressure in the early production phase of the well.

Well X is a gas well completed in an elevated pressure and temperature reservoir on a land terrain. The reservoir is about 13000ftss deep, with a temperature of 219°F and a reservoir pressure of 9300psi. The well was completed, cleaned up and brought to production about a year ago and annular pressures were observed.

This paper details the different approaches used in diagnosing the sustained annular pressures – separating thermal effect from sustained pressure due to leak. It shows the different scenarios of leak paths identified and how these were streamlined.

The paper also highlights the integration of data acquired during the investigation. Some of the data acquired include well annuli pressures, high precision temperature logs, spectral noise logs and electromagnetic corrosion logs.