Drilling the Point Pleasant-Utica Shale Fractured Formation During the COVID-19 Pandemic Utilizing CBHP MPD with a PMCD Contingency

Drilling the Point Pleasant-Utica formation in the Appalachian Basin has posed challenges to most operators, especially in Western Pennsylvania. A recent well drilled in this region demonstrated that with proper buy-in from the Operator, Constant Bottomhole Pressure (CBHP) Managed Pressure Drilling (MPD) could be the answer when planned and executed correctly. This paper drives the point that MPD is more than simply dropping chokes on location. Prior to drilling the well, the Operator initiated the communication very early with the MPD service provider and created an avenue to reduce the projected mud weight and develop a detailed CBHP MPD plan with a Pressurized Mudcap Drilling (PMCD) contingency. The anticipated challenges on this well were: High-pressure gas fractures, formation instability/shale breakout, severe/total loss of returns, inability to reach Target Depth, and casing/cementing issues. The Operator took time and worked with the new MPD service provider to carefully design and plan a new well (referred to as ‘Y1’ in this document), which helped execute the MPD part of the project within 30 days. In contrast, the MPD execution on a previous well (referred to as ‘X2’ in this document) with the older MPD service provider took more than 90 days. MPD execution on the new MPD well included dynamic influx management and loss mitigation, and understanding of the petro-physical conditions to reach the target. The significant factors that helped drill this well safely with a low Non-Productive Time (NPT) are excellent safety culture, communication, high quality and well-maintained MPD equipment, and a very knowledgeable and highly experienced MPD team. This project was finished within half of the budgeted Authorization for Expenditure (AFE), setting milestones in this region for this Operator.

Ohio

In recent years, as a result of Ohio’s Utica shale boom, Ohio courts have confronted the issue of how to apply the Ohio Marketable Title Act. As with many statutes, there are generally two questions to answer: (1) does the particular statute apply to the particular facts of the case? and (2) if the statute applies in the first instance, how does a court apply the statute to the particular facts of the case?

Gathering Pipeline Methane Emissions in Utica Shale Using an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle and Ground-Based Mobile Sampling

The United States Environmental Protection Agency Greenhouse Gas Inventory only recently updated the emission factors of natural gas gathering pipelines in April 2019 from the previous estimates based on a 1990s study of distribution pipelines. Additional measurements are needed from different basins for more accurate assessments of methane emissions from natural gas midstream industries and hence the overall climate implications of natural gas as the interim major energy source for the next decade. We conducted an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) survey and a ground-based vehicle sampling campaign targeting gathering pipeline systems in the Utica Shale from March to April in 2019. Out of 73 km of pipeline systems surveyed, we found no leaks on pipelines and two leaks on an accessory block valve with leak rates of 3.8 ± 0.4 and 7.6 ± 0.8 mg/s. The low leak frequency phenomenon was also observed in the only existing gathering pipeline study in Fayetteville Shale. The UAV sampling system facilitated ease of access, broadened the availability of pipelines for leak detection, and was estimated to detect methane leaks down to 0.07 g/s using Gaussian dispersion modeling. For future UAV surveys adopting similar instrument setup and dispersion models, we recommend arranging controlled release experiments first to understand the system’s detection limit and choosing sampling days with steady and low wind speeds (2 m/s).