Total 616 words used.
Introduction
Northern Area Production Engineering Department (NAPED) of Saudi Aramco oversee the production of Northern Area non-associated gas wells from the award-winning Karan project. Karan gas field is located offshore of the Arabian Gulf in Saudi Arabian. It is the first non-associated gas field being developed in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Karan project won several awards, such as OTC 2022 Distinguished Achievement Award for Companies. To enhance the existing well design, NAPED initiated external benchmarking efforts with regional and international major companies to evaluate new innovative designs. This application narratives the story of the success story of NAPED benchmarking and continuous improvement led to a new gas wells design (Hybrid Design) providing even higher production rates at more reliable and safer conditions utilizing international best practices.
NAPED Visit & Benchmarking with Leading Australian Natural Gas Company
As an initiative from NAPED to compare best practices and benchmark internationally with a renowned gas producer, NAPED visited a leading Australian natural gas company producer in their headquarters. The two-organization conducted a thorough review of their well designs, covering aspects related to gas compositions, pressure, temperature, solid content, subsurface formations stresses, drilling challenges, vertical/horizontal designs, production rates, wellhead designs, metallurgy, maintenance procedures, monitoring and surveillance practices, among others. The outcomes of this great interactive benchmarking activity led to evaluation of several practices of leading Australian gas company that were implemented in NAPED. They include a proposal new well design (Hybrid Design) which was never been drilled in Saudi Aramco’s history. As such, the department needed to thoroughly evaluate the proposal and conduct additional benchmarking and best practices comparisons of other renowned companies. After consulting subject matter experts from the Society of Petroleum Engineers, a regional leading national oil and gas company was selected as a regional great partner to benchmark with. The benefits of selecting a regional company is that the offshore fields of Saudi Aramco and the regional company share similar geologic and fluid properties, this is due to the proximity as compared to the leading Australian energy company fields.
NAPED Benchmarking with Leading Regional Energy Company & Literature
NAPED approached the regional leading national oil and gas company Subject matter experts for benchmarking opportunities during SPE/IADC Middle East Drilling Technology Conference, held in Abu Dhabi, May 2021. NAPED and regional leading national oil and gas company focal points exchanged information and benchmarked their best practices. NAPED management encouraged its employees to always seek continuous improvement opportunities and compare industry best practices with regional and international players, in addition to conducting journal and literature reviews (through onepetro.org technical publication database) with other organizations. After distilling the outcomes from Australian gas company, the regional national oi land gas company, and literature review in addition to internal SME various meetings and discussion. The Hybrid design was approved and the first well in Saudi Aramco with Hybrid Design was completed October 2023.
Gas Well Hybrid Design
The hybrid gas well design capitalizes on the intricate and immaculate integration of different tubular sizes, downhole equipment, metallurgies, near-surface equipment, safety equipment and surface wellhead design configuration that offer the higher possible production rate, while providing more cost-effective design and maintaining the most safe, reliable, tested and approved equipment. The first well has been tested and has delivered double the capacity of the original old design, which is a quantum-leap from where the original gas wells started. Even though the original project as a whole is still winning awards; this new gas wells hybrid design promises to revolutionize the future gas projects, providing a whole perspective to design innovation, organizational management and leadership leading to benchmarking and continuous improvement, and exposing young professional to highly intense development and hands-on training and implementation.
Nomination Title: Gas Wells Hybrid Design
