Jim. Here's what I've seen on this rig and it's technology:
<The new piece of specialty equipment, made in Salt Lake City by Lang Exploratory Drilling, is being used to tackle the tough the basalt.
Delahoussaye, who works at the EnCana site as the company's Washington representative, watched past efforts fail to break through 5,000 to 8,000 feet of basalt for the 14,000-foot exploratory natural gas well.
A new drill arrived in August after initial work was halted in February.
And so far they have drilled through another 1,500 feet of basalt -- for a total of 3,000 feet.
"It's working a lot better than anyone thought it would," Delahoussaye said.
The drill works like this: Air is pumped down a 19-inch diameter hole in between two pipes, a 4-inch pipe inside a nearly 7-inch pipe.
Basalt chunks, mud and air are then pushed out of the smaller pipe as more ground is broke through with the help of 50,000 pounds of applied drilling weight.
And every day, 200 gallons of water are used to mix a clay and gel fluid that goes into the pipes to help bring the cuttings to the surface. The piles of cuttings will later be hauled away from the site.
When the crew is done with the larger drill, another drilling rig which Delahoussaye considers more standard equipment will be brought in.
Then the specialty drill will be moved to another natural gas drilling site eight miles north of Sunnyside.>
Above excerpted by article ref via url below:
tri-cityherald.com
DPTR has a 20% interest in this well, and I believe in the rest of the large ECA/Shell acreage position in the play.
Iso |
