Patent Application
20110281777
The invention relates to fluids used for drilling and completing oil wells and in particular those useful for deterring tar/heavy oil accretion on metal surfaces.
The process of drilling a hole in the ground for the extraction of a natural resource requires a fluid for removing cuttings from the wellbore, controlling formation pressures and maintaining hole stability. Drilling through oil sand formations causes problematic accretion of tar on drilling apparatus. Bitumen accretion on metal surfaces impairs drilling operations by blinding shale shaker screens, plugging centrifuges and drill bits, torque and drag increase and stuck pipe or casing. Standard drilling practices through oil sand formations, which are generally unconsolidated, can also lead to hole instability problems.
Solvents, surfactants and viscosifiers have been used in drilling fluids for drilling through bitumen containing formations. In addition, or alternately, drilling fluids have been chilled to deter accretion and enhance hole stability.
A drilling fluid and a method for drilling have been invented.
In accordance with one aspect of the present invention, there is provided a drilling fluid comprising: a non-ionic surfactant including at least one of a branched alcohol ethoxylate and a capped alcohol ethoxylate, a detergent builder and a viscosifier.
In accordance with another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method for drilling a wellbore through a formation, the method comprising: operating a drilling assembly to drill a wellbore and circulating a drilling fluid through the wellbore as it is drilled, the drilling fluid including: a non-ionic surfactant including at least one of a branched alcohol ethoxylate and a capped alcohol ethoxylate, a detergent builder and a viscosifier.
It is to be understood that other aspects of the present invention will become readily apparent to those skilled in the art from the following detailed description, wherein various embodiments of the invention are shown and described by way of illustration. As will be realized, the invention is useful for other and different embodiments and its several details are capable of modification in various other respects, all without departing from the spirit and scope of the present invention. Accordingly the drawings and detailed description are to be regarded as illustrative in nature and not as restrictive.
A drilling fluid and a method for drilling a wellbore has been invented for use in formations bearing heavy oil, also called bitumen or tar. The drilling fluid and method are useful to limit and possibly remove tar accretion on metal surfaces and/or to maintain borehole stability, while working with standard viscosifiers and other chemicals used in drilling fluids. The drilling fluid and method may therefore be environmentally responsible and economically viable.
A drilling fluid according to the present invention includes a non-ionic surfactant, a detergent builder and a viscosifier.
In this drilling fluid, it is believed that the non-ionic surfactant acts to limit tar sand accretion to metal surfaces perhaps by adsorbing onto surfaces or interfaces to change the interfacial tensions and/or the electrical potentials. The non-ionic surfactant may be effective in producing stearic barriers for prevention of tar deposition. The adsorption of the surfactant onto the bitumen will have the hydrophilic group oriented toward the metal. Surfactant molecules adsorbed onto the bitumen particles will have the hydrophilic group oriented toward the metal surfaces. Since viscosifiers may be anionic, a non-ionic surfactant avoids a reaction such as precipitation when operating with the viscosifiers. It is desired that the non-ionic surfactants have a water wetting, detergent characteristics, for example, that may have a hydrophilic-lipophilic balance (HLB) number of 11 to 15. Surfactants with an HLB over 15 may dissolve the bitumen and such solubility is generally not desirable as this may lead to hole instability, high washouts and waste volumes. The non-ionic surfactant may also be low foaming. Modifying the structure of the surfactant's molecule to keep the surface activity while producing unstable foam can be realized by replacing the straight-chain lipophilic group with a branched chain or by using two different sized or shaped lipophilic groups. Changes may be made on the hydrophilic part of the molecule by placing the second lipophobic group into the molecule at some distance, for example a few carbon atoms, or by putting two bulky lipophobic groups on the same carbon atom. Some useful non-ionic surfactants include capped or branched alcohol ethoxylate, such as for example ethoxylated alcohols, ethoxylated propoxylated alcohols, etc. “Capped” implies that—OH moieties are capped with a moiety such as a short alkyl group. Some commercially available non-ionic surfactants that may be useful in a drilling fluid may include one or more of:
The use of a non-ionic surfactant according to those described gives a drilling fluid detergent characteristics.
A drilling fluid according to the present invention further includes a detergent builder. As will be appreciated, a detergent builder enhances the action of a detergent. Generally, it is believed that builders operate as water wetting agents and remove cations such as of calcium (Ca++) and magnesium (Mg++), whose presence in the system may impair the detergent action. As such, a builder may reduce the amount of surfactant to be used over a system where no builder is used. This may offer numerous benefits including reducing the amount of tar which is dissolved into the drilling fluid, and thereby enhancing the reuse of the drilling fluid.
Inorganic builders of interest include phosphates, silicates, and oxygen releasing compounds such as perborates and borates. Some builders that may be of interest include one or more of:
The use of a builder in the drilling fluid enhances performance of the surfactant such that generally less surfactant needs to be used compared to a system without a builder and the drilling fluid may be reused.
Viscosifiers provide carrying capacity to a drilling fluid. Viscosifiers, for example, increase the viscosity of drilling fluid so that it can carry cuttings along with the flow of drilling fluid. Viscosifiers may also act to reduce fluid loss by inhibiting fluid infiltration to the formation. Viscosifiers may prevent deposition or re-deposition of the bitumen on metal surfaces by suspending the tar and tar sand particles in the fluid. Some common viscosifiers useful in embodiments of the present drilling fluid may include, for example, any of: xanthan gum, wellan gum, schleroglucan and/or guar gum.
In one embodiment, a water-based drilling fluid may be prepared using 0.5-1.5% by weight surfactant, 0.5%-1.0% by weight builder and 0.2-0.4% by weight viscosifier.
In one example embodiment, a water-based drilling fluid may be prepared including: 0.5-1.5% by weight of alkyl polyethylene glycol ester, 0.5%-1.0% by weight of a phosphate-type builder or a borate-type builder and 0.2-0.4% by weight xanthan gum.
In one example embodiment, a water-based drilling fluid may be prepared including: 0.5-1.5% by weight of chlorine capped ethoxylated C9-11 (C10 rich) alcohol, 0.5%-1.0% by weight of a zeolite-type builder and 0.2-0.4% by weight xanthan gum.
A drilling fluid according to the present invention may also include, if desired, a lubricant, also termed a secondary surfactant. The lubricant may act to soften the tar and provide a lubricating action to assist drilling and running liners into long horizontal sections of a wellbore. The lubricant may be non-ionic. High flash point vegetable oils, such as those having a flash point greater than 148° C., may be of some use in the present drilling fluids. Useful lubricants may include, for example, fatty acid methyl esters for example with an HLB of about 6, such as are commonly available as soybean oil, for example, commercially available as SoyClear™ products by AG Environmental Products, LLC or Oleocal™ products by Lambent Technologies Corp., or canola oil. Lubricants may be added to the drilling fluid when the fluid is prepared, directly into the tanks and may alternately or in addition by added by application first to metal surfaces such as shale shakers, etc. at surface to thereby enter the drilling fluid stream.
In one embodiment, a water-based drilling fluid may be prepared as set out above including 0.5-1.5% by weight secondary surfactant such as, for example, 0.5-1.5% by weight of a methyl ester of soybean oil.
Fluid loss reducers may also be used in a drilling fluid according to the present invention if desired. Some common fluid loss reducers include, for example, starches, PAC (polyanionic cellulose) and/or CMC (carboxy methyl cellulose). Some of these chemicals may also have a viscosifying function. The fluid loss reduces may provide steric stabilization for the non-ionic surfactants.
The drilling fluid may contain various defoamers such as silicone defoamers, etc. as desired.
The drilling fluid is useful to inhibit tar accretion on metal surfaces. In one aspect the drilling fluid can be used in a method for drilling a wellbore through an oil sand containing formation. In such a method, without the present additive, tar and drill cuttings can adhere as accretions to the metal surfaces of the drilling assembly, and metal surfaces in the wellbore such as liners and casing. Thus, the present method includes circulating the aqueous-based drilling fluid, as described above, while operating a drilling assembly to drill the wellbore.
In another aspect the drilling fluid may be used to remove existing accretions on metal surfaces as by circulation through a wellbore or washing of the wellbore surface systems.
The drilling fluid may be reused repeatedly by simply removing drill cuttings it contains. It will be appreciated that a drilling assembly can include, for example, a drill bit and possibly other cutting surfaces, a drill string, and various control and monitoring subs.
It will also be appreciated, that it may not be necessary to use the same drilling mud throughout an entire drilling operation. For example, a drilling mud selected to control accretion may not be required during drilling through the over burden. The method is particularly useful during drilling wherein oil sand drill cuttings are being produced and very useful where there is more frequent contact between metal surfaces or metal surfaces and the wellbore wall such as, for example, during drilling of the build section and the horizontal section of a wellbore.
Where, during drilling using a drilling fluid according to the present invention, accretions are being deposited to an undesirable extent, the composition can be adjusted to, for example, increase surfactant or secondary surfactant, to inhibit further undesirable amounts of accretion and possibly to remove, at least to some degree, those accretions already deposited.
In the following examples, the test additives are referenced by the product names set out in Table 1.
Tables 2 to 14 includes results from various tests conducted, wherein the samples are prepared by adding 200 mL of water in a mixing cup followed by the test additives and by 40 g of tar sand core material. Each sample is then mixed 15 to 20 seconds on a multimixer prior to placement in 260 mL rolling cell with a corresponding pre-weighed metal bar. The samples are rolled for 30 min. Then the tar accretion is measured by weight gain of the bars and by observation. The tests are run at room temperature.
The previous description of the disclosed embodiments is provided to enable any person skilled in the art to make or use the present invention. Various modifications to those embodiments will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art, and the generic principles defined herein may be applied to other embodiments without departing from the spirit or scope of the invention. Thus, the present invention is not intended to be limited to the embodiments shown herein, but is to be accorded the full scope as defined in the claims, wherein reference to an element in the singular, such as by use of the article “a” or “an” is not intended to mean “one and only one” unless specifically so stated, but rather “one or more”. All structural and functional equivalents to the elements of the various embodiments described throughout the disclosure that are known or later come to be known to those of ordinary skill in the art are intended to be encompassed by the elements of the claims. Moreover, nothing disclosed herein is intended to be dedicated to the public regardless of whether such disclosure is explicitly recited in the claims. No claim element is to be construed under the provisions of 35 USC 112, sixth paragraph, unless the element is expressly recited using the phrase “means for” or “step for”.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2594108 | Jul 2007 | CA | national |
This application is a divisional application of U.S. application Ser. No. 12/025,164 filed Feb. 4, 2008, which is presently pending. U.S. application Ser. No. 12/025,164 and the present application claim priority under 35 U.S.C. §119(e) to U.S. provisional patent application No. 60/894,121 filed Mar. 9, 2007 and to Canadian patent application No. 2,594,108 filed Jul. 19, 2007.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 60894121 | Mar 2007 | US |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parent | 12025164 | Feb 2008 | US |
| Child | 13193170 | US |
