Increasing Production and Reducing Rig Costs in Complex Drilling Operations
In 2007, the Annual Technical Conference and Exhibition of the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) was held in Anaheim, CA, from 11-14 November. At the Conference, Morten Irgens (Actenum) and Lashar Lavenue (Saudi Aramco) presented a technical paper entitled "Increasing Production and Reducing Rig Costs in Complex Drilling Operations".
As the number of drilling and workover rigs in use in an organization increases, the challenge of scheduling their use and transportation grows exponentially. Ensuring that the right rig is in the right place at the right time, while minimizing rig transportation cost, is practically unmanageable using a manual approach.
This paper described an automated schedule optimization application, based on Actenum RAS, that supports schedulers in their daily work. The application provides key features:
- The rig schedule is re-optimized, and not merely patched or rescheduled as operational assumptions change;
- The impact of scheduling decisions on user-defined key performance indicators (such as production output and transportation cost) is immediately displayed, allowing evaluation of "what-if?" scenarios before selection of an appropriate approach;
- Schedule optimization is supported by a sophisticated user interface enabling direct schedule manipulation in response to changing needs.
Early results show significant reduction in rig movement costs and increased production. Schedule quality and collaboration among the groups involved with drilling operations has increased. The flexibility and responsiveness of the scheduling process has also improved, and the gap between schedule preparation and execution has been closed.