(task) What will it take to fix the Porter Ranch leaking gas well?

USRS CA RS

4 cover

petro, environment

> http://www.dailynews.com/general-news/20151219/what-will-it-take-to-fix-the-porter-ranch-leaking-gas-well <http://www.dailynews.com/general-news/20151219/what-will-it-take-to-fix-the-porter-ranch-leaking-gas-well>
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> What will it take to fix the Porter Ranch leaking gas well?
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> The latest attempt by Southern California Gas Co. to kill its leaking well above Porter Ranch <http://www.dailynews.com/general-news/20151219/two-months-in-porter-ranch-gas-leak-compared-to-bp-gulf-oil-spill> amounts to a deep shot in the dark.
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> All the repair crew has to do is hit a 7-inch target at the bottom of a shaft a mile and a half under Oat Mountain at the northern rim of the San Fernando Valley.
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> Undoubtedly, it’s a complicated situation, one industry expert said.
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> “I think when you look at the fact that some of the best well-kill operators in the nation have not been able to put a stop to it is testament to how abnormal and complex this leak is,” said Timothy O’Connor, director of oil and gas programs for the Environmental Defense <http://inewsource.org/2015/12/14/methane-leak-worst-state-history/> Fund, and who used to inspect refineries and other facilities for the Bay Area Air Quality Management District.
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> This phase of the kill attempt consists of a relief well that has been erected to the east of the leaking well at a lower elevation. The work is being done by the world-renowned firm of Boots & Coots <http://halliburton.com/en-US/ps/production-solutions/pressure-control/well-control-prenvention-services.page?node-id=hgoxbypm>, which snuffed out oil well fires after the Gulf War.
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> Boots & Coots, which is owned by Halliburton Co., declined requests for interviews about what is happening on the mountain. Spokeswoman Susie McMichael referred questions to SoCalGas.
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> Residents have been fleeing the community for accommodations paid for by the gas company.
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> As of Friday evening, 2,009 families were in temporary housing, 884 were awaiting a decision on their request and the company was trying to contact 1,474 families seeking assistance.
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> So far 821 families have declined assistance and 93 have moved back to their homes, the company said.
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> Additionally, two neighborhood schools are being closed, and students and staff are being relocated.
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> The relief well drilling is on schedule and the bore hole was at about 2,800 feet, the company said in an email.
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> It’s a time-consuming fix that could take up to four months, but SoCalGas officials believe this effort will succeed after other kill attempts failed.
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> “We are very confident. The folks we have working on this have a track record of 100 percent success. They have 40 years of experience and they have never missed,” said Jimmie Cho, SoCalGas’ senior vice president of gas operations and system integrity.
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> But a second relief well site also is being prepared, just in case, he said.
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> The problem is a failure in the casing of well SS 25 in the company’s massive 3,600-acre Aliso Canyon <http://alisoupdates.com/main> storage facility in the Santa Susana Mountains. The mountain is a sandstone formation, and the company pumps gas down more than 8,000 feet where it migrates into the rock’s pores. It can hold 86 billion cubic feet of gas.
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> The leak is about 500 feet below the surface, and an estimated 1,200 tons of methane are escaping into the atmosphere each day, according to the California Air Resources Board.
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> L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti has proclaimed the leak “an unprecedented environmental disaster for the city of Los Angeles.”
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> 24/7 OPERATION
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> The relief well drilling is a 24/7 operation, Cho said.
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> The rate of drilling depends on what conditions the workers encounter underground, and each phase of the operation has a different objective, gas spokesman Javier Mendoza said in an email.
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> The company had reached a depth of about 2,800 feet as of Friday evening.
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> The pace will slow when the work moves into the “ranging phase” to locate the leaking well.
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> “The objective in this phase is not to drill for distance but to locate and positively identify the 7-inch leaking well. As we progress along this phase, the drilling crew will alternate between drilling and ranging, requiring the (drill) bit to be retracted and exchanged with the ranging tool. Just switching the tools out could take up to a day each time,” Mendoza said.
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> THE TECHNOLOGY
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> Operators at the relief well site are using a technology called active magnetic ranging <http://halliburton.com/en-US/ps/sperry/drilling/magnetic-ranging/active-magnetic-ranging/default.page?node-id=hvklsxp2>. It enables them to basically seek and destroy their underground target without actually seeing it.
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> “We put in a device that sends out a current and creates a magnetic field and then induces the current on the well we want to fix,” Cho said. “It’s almost a radar type of system that pings back how far away it is and helps us triangulate on the well we want to fix.”
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> According to Halliburton’s website, AMR consists of two main components: the magnetic field generator and the detection device.
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> This allows for the “precise measurement of distance and direction between two or more well bores,” it states.
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> It can also position well bores “within extremely tight tolerances,” which is needed in the case of this leak.
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> “We will know exactly where we are and how close we are to the (leaking) well so we can intercept it,” Cho said.
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> THE DRILLING
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> The first thing the crew is doing is drilling a well shaft down to near the bottom of the leaking well site.
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> The new shaft started out at about a 30-degree angle, and when it reaches the correct distance from SS 25 it will basically go straight down, Cho said.
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> The drilling bits are made of high-strength carbon steel.
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> A 12-inch diameter bit will drill the well’s bore hole to approximately 4,000 feet. Then an 8.5-inch-bit will drill to approximately 8,500 feet to enter the gas storage zone.
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> As the well is being drilled, the crew will install a casing until it is within 50 feet of the target well.
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> Then a 3-inch pipe will be inserted into the casing.
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> The new well tube consists of 30-foot sections of pipe that are screwed into each other.
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> A 6-inch milling bit attached to the bottom of the tube will be used to intercept the target well and drill into it.
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> The milling bit is engineered to allow the fatal cocktail to flow into the bottom the leaking well and kill it.
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> “Initially it will be some sort of drilling mud, clay-like matter that is heavy, and we will follow that with cement. All of this will be done under pressure. We will fill every nook and cranny. It’s a permanent abandonment,” Cho said of well SS 25.
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> OTHER STEPS
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> Pressure is a problem that the crews have been dealing with since the leak was discovered on Oct. 23. Initially, pressure of about 2,700 pounds per square inch was pushing the gas to the surface.
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> As of late last week the pressure in the gas reservoir was about 1,900 pounds per square inch, Cho said, and about 1,400 pounds per square inch at the surface.
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> And while the relief well is being drilled, crews are still working at SS 25 and will continue to try to kill the well with the standard technique of pumping brine and other materials down the shaft.
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> The company also is working with international engineering firms to come up with a system to capture the gas leaking at the surface and put it into the distribution system, Cho said.
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> “We’re making good progress,” he said of work at the relief well. “But in addition to that were are (going to continue) to bring gas out of the field and deliver it to customers. What that does is allow the pressure in the field to go down, and as the rate of pressure goes down, the rate of the gas coming out of the leak also goes down.”