Vol. 59 No. 1
January 2007
Cutting-edge technology for oil and gas and geothermal drilling is the focus of the 2007 SPE/IADC Drilling Conference to be held in Amsterdam 20–22 February 2007. The conference, to be held at the RAI Congress Center, will deliver up-to-the-minute information about this fast-evolving technology area. The theme of this year’s conference, “Reaching Out To Discover and Recover,” emphasizes the industry’s goal of accessing reserves beyond the reach of what has been encountered previously. One of the three planned plenary sessions, “Reserves Beyond Our Reach,” will be presented on Tuesday, 20 February. The second plenary session, “Technology Won’t Solve Our People Problem,” is planned for Wednesday, 21 February. A third session, “High Prices Prevent High Performance,” is scheduled for Thursday, 22 February.
More than 100 technical presentations are planned under a platform of 16 topics:
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Mature Fields.
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Drilling Fluids.
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Downhole Drilling.
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Drilling Optimization.
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Well Planning and Extended-Reach Drilling.
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Deepwater Drilling.
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Bit Technology.
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Tubulars.
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Geomechanics.
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Case Histories.
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Health, Safety, Security, and Environment.
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Rig Technology.
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Managed-Pressure Drilling.
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Cementing.
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Casing While Drilling.
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Completions.
Plenary Session Details
The first plenary session—“Reserves Beyond Our Reach”—will define the types of reserves that currently are considered beyond the industry’s reach. There are reserves considered to be out of reach as a result of technical limits, and some reserves are beyond industry reach because of government legislation. Moderator Ivo Bozon of McKinsey and Co., along with panelists Saleh Al-Dawas of Saudi Aramco, Sami Iskander of Schlumberger Technology Corp., and Chris Reddick of BP, will address the challenges of reaching reserves that today appear out of reach the same way that some of today’s recoverable reserves appeared out of reach a quarter of a century ago.
A second plenary, “Technology Won’t Solve Our People Problem,” will examine truths about whether technology has delivered on its promise of doing more with less, or is the industry simply doing more with more? Why has the demand for numbers of beds on offshore drilling rigs steadily increased year after year? Are we any closer to the dream of remote or automated drilling operations? Moderator Walter Simpson of BG Group and panelists Paul Goodfellow of Shell, Vik Rao of Halliburton, Jeff Saile of Ensco, and François Viaud of Total will discuss why finding people continues to be one of the industry’s greatest challenges and how technology has not delivered in helping to alleviate the talent crisis.
The third plenary, “High Prices Prevent High Performance,” will discuss how, when prices for commodities and services have risen faster than can be supported by organic growth of supply, it is extremely pertinent to consider what sort of performance can be expected and delivered in this situation. Moderator Bernard J. Duroc-Danner of Weatherford Intl. and panelists Dave Blackwood of BP Exploration Operating Co., Jean Cahuzac of Transocean, Jose Formigli of Petrobras, and Chakib Sbiti of Schlumberger Oilfield Services will discuss the reasons for the high price scenario, the outlook for the future, and the effect on performance from operator, drilling contractor, and major service company viewpoints.
Drilling Award
This year’s SPE Drilling Engineering Award will be presented to Curtis Blount, Well Supervisor/Adviser specializing in remedial well interventions and CT Technology Adviser for ConocoPhillips Alaska. He has been instrumental in and has provided significant contributions to the advancement of coiled-tubing (CT) intervention technology, CT-drilling technology, and numerous other well-intervention and logging technologies for more than 20 years. Blount has coauthored more than 30 technical papers and holds 20 patents. He has served as an SPE Distinguished Lecturer on CT-drilling technology, cochaired the first SPE Forum devoted entirely to CT technology, twice cochaired the SPE-ICoTA Roundtable, and presented the SPE Applied Technology Workshop on CT Drilling. Blount studied nuclear engineering at Oregon State U.
The most widely attended conference of its kind, the SPE/IADC conference also will feature an extensive exhibit showcasing new-generation drilling tools and services. More information on the conference can be found at www.spe.org.
