The oil leak

[Myron Beaumont]

How about a few tons of lead shot into the hole ,followed by a soft plastic/nylon very long slightly tapered "self tapper ",followed possibly by the same again .After all ,if you can drill at that depth ,surely an end fitting could be attached to drive home a fairly rigid plug of some sort ,Even if it reduced the flow ,it would enable any further action easier to implement .

Any ideas ?

[kiwi g]

Me dumb builder but.

If you can pump concrete up hill then why dont they pump quickset down hill. lets face it the oilrigs toast and if you pump till the concete goes hard surely your going to get to some fair depth.

Mind you , think about the bigger picture myron. Imagine how much theyll make out of putting the price of fuel up because they had a big loss of crude. got to make the money back somewhere,

bring on the hydro car I say

Edited By kiwi g on 30/05/2010 11:17:21

[kiwi g]

Second thoughts .. 

Thunder birds are go.

Wheres international rescue when we need them.

[Doug Ireland]

Posted by Myron Beaumont on 30/05/2010 11:01:38:

How about a few tons of lead shot into the hole ,followed by a soft plastic/nylon very long slightly tapered "self tapper ",followed possibly by the same again .After all ,if you can drill at that depth ,surely an end fitting could be attached to drive home a fairly rigid plug of some sort ,Even if it reduced the flow ,it would enable any further action easier to implement .

Any ideas ?

 Myron, the plug method you mentioned is widely used when a well is to be abandoned. The wellbore is usually filled with a cement plug that is pumped down drill pipe to a predetermined depth. The hole is then filled with inhibited water and a plug is rammed into the hole. My understanding of the problem is that the "Blow-Out-Preventer", or BOP for short, that is sitting on the seabed has either been too badly damaged during the accident or has become detached completely from the seabed. Until this can be repaired/replaced it will be very difficult to get control of the well.

[Myron Beaumont]

Doug 

OK , I didn't know that .In fact nobody knows just where the fractures are (I presume ) but it can't be that far from the sea bed I would think ?Hence the long (& I mean very long) bendable self tapper type insert . The pressure down there must be in the order of tons per square inch ,but looking at the videos it(the leak) comes out at a fairly medium plume so to speak .A bit like a guyser on the surface to look at .The differencial pressure being not of the highest order is what I'm saying (guessing)

[Doug Ireland]

I think the well is flowing at about 2,000 barrels or 84,000 US Gallons per day so that's quite a geyser!

[Myron Beaumont]

A very slick geyser  Eh ? Another idea could maybe a sort or upside down umberella type thing that grips better the more pressure there is OR gradually sleeve down the hole in increments to stop the flow eventually .or capture it into a sea floor to surface pipe(probably be at very high velocity but controllable ) I just wonder what sort of pressures we're talking about -the whole sea floor pressing down on the oil trapped underneath it ,or is the oil well below the floor so as not to be affected by it ? ie solid rock ,

Edited By Myron Beaumont on 31/05/2010 15:49:09

[kiwi g]

I suppose a drill rig of that size only drills one size hole  otherwise maybe drill a larger diametre hole over the existing  and then its captured via the standard rig again.

What depth of water are they talking.

 

[Phil Claridge]

over a mile down kiwi

[leccyflyer]

If it were as simple as putting a plug in, isn't it pretty obvious that it would have already been done?.

 

There's approximately a mile of thick-walled steel pipe attached to the wellbore, in a mile deep water. The kink in the ppie, just above the wellhead, is apparently restricting the flow, keeping it at a fraction of what the open hole flow would be. There are several other fractures and kinks in the pipe - each one of which is also leaking,  Gaining access to thhe wellhead would mean cutting the riser away - which has been put forward as being necessary - using a diamond wire saw.

 

To get anything into the end of the pipe is similar to trying to use one firehose to stop another firehose from flowing by exceeding the flow rate, but with them just held approximately facing each other. There is no means to pressure seal that interface.

 

The chances are that this well will only be brought under control when the relief well, which is being drilled to intersect the damaged well in the subsurface, has been completed. That is still a couple of months away.

Edited By leccyflyer on 31/05/2010 23:26:22

[Peter 'Ivanna Crashalot' Savage]

People's lives need to be at stake to call in international rescue!

 

Massive cork I say! Or expanding foam? 

[kiwi g]

I agree with you guys, if were as simple as plugging or whatever it would have been done. boring that second hole to relieve the pressure must be a bit hit and miss also.

What size would a big rig bore be.   300mm / 600mm /1m  ?

 

Peter peoples lives are at stake. you cant have  major leaks of crude oil polluting the sea without there being some major enviromental kick back.

What if they cant stop or plug that leak.  capture would be the next money making exercise. Capture of oil from the water that is.

[Doug Ireland]

Kiwi g,

Most well-bores start off at 30" and then depending on the depth/deviation of the well, different diameter casing is then cemented into the earths crust.

 

A tool called a Bridge Plug could have been run into the well to plug it off if the pipe hadn't been damaged. Once they can get the damaged gear out of the way it should be quite simple to control the well.

 

The company I work for make all sorts of fancy tools to control wayward oil wells.

[kiwi g]

Doug.  a bit of overtime at work then at the moment

 

Do they have remote subs capable of cutting gear (pipes) or is the operation controlled via the drill rod.elevator style. with the gear attached to the rod for cutting  ,lifting retrieving etc.

Interested kiwi.g

[Doug Ireland]

In this instance I would imagine the cutting would be done by ROV (Remotely Operated Vehicle) then it would probably be lifted off by a drilling rig. It will be interesting to see what company BP hires to get this well under control. Won't be us though, not really our area of expertise.

[leccyflyer]

The cutting off of  the riser will be done by an ROV. Initially the word was that a diamond wire saw would be used, as that would offer less resistance to the flow that a circular cut off saw blade. The first pictures of the procedure show a circular saw blade being used.

 

It's worth pointing out that cutting off the riser as part of te next attempt to cap the well will undoubtedly greatly increase te flow rate. The series of kinks in the pipe that sit above the wellhead are restricting the flow somewhat.

 

When that is cut away the flow will be unrestrained and will be the full flow rate that the well is capable of. In the short term it'll increase the amount of oil and gas coming out and, in the event the attempt to cap the well fails, we may end up worse off than if the riser had been left in place.

[Peter 'Ivanna Crashalot' Savage]

How much oil is in the well? surely it would just be best to let it escape, put a surface skimmer on the top to stop it then gather it up

[David E]

If a kink in the exposed pipe is restricting the flow, would it be possible to clamp the pipe shut by crushing it? Perhaps then enclosing the crushed part in concrete??

 

I think there will be a very large volume of oil in there. They have been trying to skim it off the surface all along - it's not very effective

 

I wonder what would happen if they piped oxygen down there and burned the oil as it came out???

[leccyflyer]

The Macondo field has published reserves of about 50 million barrels of oil ( which is about 2,100,000,000 Gallons).  That doesn't mean, of course that all of that oil would come out of the reservoir if the well remains unplugged,.

 

It wouldn't.  There would, however be a massive amount of oil put out onto the Gulf. It could even flow for years at the current rate of flow.

 

Leaving the well to "empty" the reservoir and trying to capture or clean up what comes out is not a viable option.

 

The Blowout  Preventer was supposed to crush the pipe shut, but for whatever reason, failed to do so. There was talk of trying to cut the riser, remove the debris and piggyback a second BOP stack onto the remaining pipe, but I'm not sure if there is sufficient length of pipe to allow that. Some accounts have said that the kinked section is right on top of the wellhead, with very little space available. Other schematics, listed as being not to scale, suggest a longer length of pipe before the "kink".

[Myron Beaumont]

How about an explosion above the "kink" to let it "implode"  .Dodgy obviously but isn't it worth a try at the underwater pressure it's at ?

I think I'm out of my depth (again)

[Tony Read 2]

The US must have loads of big subs (nukes?) ready to be decommissioned. My idea is to dredge the sea floor clear of debris. Take an old sub out to the well, sink it over the hole and fill with ballast. Nothing will shift that and should slow the release a fair bit. Then drill a relief well as necessary. If this works BP can fill my car up for a year for free!!

[John Privett]

There are a number of live feeds showing what is currently going on down there. 

 

Here's a link to one of them.

[John Privett]

And here is a page with links to video from 12 ROVs

[Doug Ireland]

The two relief wells that are being drilled at the moment will drastically reduce the flowrate of the damaged well. Whether the relief wells are "flared-off" or the oil is collected will be up to the operating company.