Exploring and Drilling

for Oil and Gas

Where can we find Oil and Gas?

Some people think that oil is in big pools underground.

Actually, most oil is trapped in the tiny pore spaces between

grains of rock or sand. Most of these pores are too small to
be seen with the naked eye.

How do we find oil-bearing rocks?

Oil and gas are found in natural traps within the earth.
These traps consist of domes or faults. Impermeable rock
above the trap prevents the oil and gas from migrating up
to surface. An impermeable rock is one that fluid
cannot pass through.
Without traps, the oil and gas could migrate all the way to
the surface and evaporate.

Example: A dome-shaped oil reservoir

Oil
Water

Example: Oil reservoir with a gas cap

Gas
Oil
Water

How do we find the oil reservoirs?

Geophysicists find reservoirs by bouncing sound waves off
them, and timing how long it takes for the sound to come
back
Computers process the data to construct pictures of what the
earth looks like underground.

source

t = 1.42 sec

t = 1.2 sec
t = 1 sec

receivers

Gas
Oil

What do we do after we find a

reservoir?

?
?

We Drill Into It ! ! !

What do we drill with ?

A Drilling Rig !
Here are a few different types of drilling rigs available:
Jackup Rig
Land Rig

For drilling in water

depths from 15 ft
to +/- 350 ft.

For drilling on land.

Inland Barge

Drill Ship

Semi-Submersible Rig
For drilling in water depths
from 8 to 30 ft.

Drill ships and semi-submersible rigs are for drilling in

water depths from 100 to 5000+ ft.

Whats a drilling rig ?

A Drilling Rig is:

A package of special equipment put together to enable us to
drill into the earth.
A drilling rig has many different parts:
a derrick, a substructure, hoisting equipment, engines for
power, drill pipe, steel tanks, pumps, solids control
equipment, and many other pieces.

This picture shows the hoisting equipment on a rig.

This equipment is used to raise or lower the drillstring, which is
picked up in 30 foot long segments, or joints, of drill pipe.
The hoisting equipment
consists of:

derrick

a crown block,
a traveling block,
drilling line,
and a drawworks to
pull the drilling line up
or down.

This shows a 30 foot section

of drill pipe being added to
the drill pipe already in the
hole.

substructure
Drill string
Drill bit

spare drill pipe

Heres a picture of the drill bit drilling the rock.

The drill string is turned at

surface, which turns the bit
at the bottom of the hole.

The teeth on the drill bit

grind the rock into
fragments, or cuttings.

Drilling mud is
pumped down the inside
of the drill pipe, through
jet nozzles in the bit,
and into the annulus.
This is the space
between the sides of the
hole and the drill pipe.

The mud lifts the

cuttings and circulates
them back to surface
where they are removed.

The Drilling Mud Cycle

1) Clean drilling mud is taken from the steel
mud tanks and pumped down the inside of the
drill pipe.
4) the mixture is
circulated across
screens at surface

screens

6) Clean mud falls

through the screens
and is returned to the
pits

3) the mixture of drilling mud and

drill cuttings are circulated up the
annulus

mud pump

5) the drill cuttings are removed, and

form a cuttings pile. This can be
hauled off and disposed of.

2) the mud is circulated through the drill bit into the

annulus, lifting the cuttings removed by the drill bit.

Heres a sequence showing how holes are drilled

First, a large drill bit is used to drill
a short interval of hole.

Then, steel casing is run and cemented on

the outside to keep the hole from
collapsing.
0

200

Next,
a smaller bit is
run inside the
first casing.

Then, this new

hole is also
cased off and
cemented.

This bit drills

out the bottom
of the casing,
and drills new
hole.
200

500

Again, a smaller
hole is drilled out,

and smaller
casing is run
to keep the
hole from
falling in.

In this way, the hole is drilled in stages, until the target reservoir rock is penetrated. At
this point, the geologists must figure out if there is oil or gas in it.

How do Geologists tell if the reservoir has oil or gas?

They do this by running logs across the zone.

Logs are tools run on electric cable

(wireline) which record the physical properties in the rock such as resistivity, porosity,
density, radioactivity, and pore pressure.

Heres an example of what a log looks like.

Geologists look at logs to decide

whether or not to complete a well (if there is oil), or abandon it (if theres no oil).
Gamma
Radiation

Electrical
Resistivity

Sand

Porosity

good
porosity

Shale

200

Siltstone
poor
resistivity,
probably
water

Shale
Siltstone
Dolomite

poor
porosity

500

Shale

Looks
like
good
sand
quality

good
resistivity,
may have
oil or gas

3000

poor
resistivity,
probably
water

good
porosity

poor
porosity
good
porosity

Can you tell where the geologist would complete this well?
Gamma
Radiation

Electrical
Resistivity

Porosity

good porosity

200
poor
resistivity,
probably
water

poor porosity

good porosity

500

poor porosity
good porosity
good
resistivity,
may have oil
or gas

Looks
like
good
sand
quality

with good porosity and resistivity.

poor
porosity

poor
resistivity,
probably water

3000

}Right here! This shows a clean sand,

good porosity

If the well looks good on the logs, we run a final string

of casing across the production zone, and cement it in place.

Then, we run perforating guns in the hole and perforate (shoot

holes ) in the casing across the productive zone.

Production tubing is run, with a packer to isolate the produced

zone from the casing above.

tubing

Packer

Finally, the well is produced into

a pipeline, which takes it to
production facilities on surface.

The production facilities on surface separate out the

Produced Gas

gas, oil, and water into their separate phases.

Oil
Production Separator

Produced
Water