Page 14: of Offshore Engineer Magazine (Jul/Aug 2019)

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SUBSEA Well Intervention

What About Well Intervention?

By Elaine Maslin n a bid to maintain production rates but with less outlay, There have been 7,000 wells drilled on the UK continen- operators have been looking closer to home. Reducing tal shelf (UKCS). Some 2,700 of those are deemed active, costs and increasing ef? ciency have been high on the and of that number about 600 were shut-in, according to the

Iagenda. Should well intervention be higher? OGA’s 2018 Wells Insight report. About 32% of the total are

Well intervention, which can help increase production or subsea wells.

restore shut-in wells, might seem like a sensible option in a According to the OGA’s data, 22 million barrels of oil lower oil price and pro? t environment. But are operators do- equivalent (boe) of production was added in 2017, through ing as much as they could? intervention operations, at an average well restoration of just

Restoring shut-in wells can add production at economic rates, $6.4/boe. “That’s an amazing rate of return,” Copland says.

Margaret Copland, senior wells and technical manager at the Yet, subsea well intervention was carried out on just 14% of

Oil & Gas Authority (OGA) told the Offshore Well Intervention wells in 2017, she said, compared with 54% of platform wells.

Europe (OWIE) conference in Aberdeen earlier this year. “Given that 30% of wells are sitting shut-in – that’s not wells 14 OFFSHORE ENGINEER OEDIGITAL.COM