Can You Afford Not To Use Drilling Software?

We decide to buy things based on the benefits those things may bring to us. Those benefits can be either tangible or intangible. If the tangible benefits are greater than the price, the decision process is easy, or if the benefits give us a perception of peace then we will most likely make the purchase.

Drilling software, in particular, is a product packed with advanced engineering calculations. One can say it is a condensed result of research, an interactive digital toolkit or an expert who never gets tired. It normally takes years of development by a well-trained team.

Setting prices for software packages is challenging because there are many uncertainties involved, such as market size, other similar products, etc. One thing is certain in any drilling software, if successfully used in pre-drilling analysis, it will most likely bring more benefits than the money spent on purchasing it. The cost of drilling an oil and gas well is so high that any non-productive time prevention (NPT) is well worth the spending.

Drilling software provides a good way of identifying potential problems in a drilling design and making good recommendations.

Take an example of casing centralizer placements, the purchase of centralizers is to provide a good casing standoff (>70%) to be better prepared for a cementing job. The standoff profile of a casing in a directional well depends on many parameters such as well path, casing weight, fluid densities, top of cement (TOC), centralizer properties and placement. Our past work experiences can help us select the proper types of centralizers and placement, but for a given well condition, it is best to use computer model to make recommendations for the centralizer usage. The following picture shows the resulting standoff profile with a designed centralizer spacing.

Standoff vs Measured Depth - Pegasus Vertex, Inc.

Standoff vs Measured Depth - CentraDesign

Thomas Edison once said: “I shall make electricity so cheap that only the rich can afford to burn candles.”

Nowadays, drilling software has become commonplace. Applying the latest drilling technology includes using the available solutions. Drilling software is like the electricity to light our understanding and design of drilling operations. Can you afford not to use it?

People Should Fall in Love with Their Eyes Closed

Advertising does have impact on people’s purchase decision. Recently, I saw quite a few TV commercials on Perrier bottled water, which shows a scene in a hot summer day. Everything is melting and a lady catches the last bottle of Perrier water before it falls into a swimming pool.

On Saturday, I bought 4 big bottles of Perrier water because the store was selling 4 bottles for $5. This year’s Labor Day was on Monday. It was so hot that I was totally soaked in sweat only after a dozens of minutes doing yard work. It was refreshing to enjoy the big bottle of Perrier water, sitting in the shade. While feeling the tiny bubbles bursting on my tongue, I studied the top and bottom labels, just to make the time in my hands useful.

Suddenly, I noticed a hand-written type of sentence on the back side of the bottom label, which read the title of this article. I was delighted. The pleasure of finding this secrecy and reading this sentence was more than that of drinking the water. How nice it is to have thirst quenched and emotion excited at the same time?! Maybe that is exactly what the bottling company designs. I was wondering.

Pegasus_Vertex_people_should_fall_in_love_with_their_eyes_closed

I admire the idea. We, as drilling engineering software developers, often do something similar on the graphic user interface (GUI) of our software. For example, users can use “Well Path” functions in our Dr. DE (drilling engineering toolbox software) to design different well trajectory.  For example, user can easily create a build-and-drop shape. Dr. DE performs the calculation and displays the results in one click.

Well Path: Build-and-drop: finding maximum inclination | Dr. DE of Pegasus Vertex, Inc.

The tabulated numbers may be too abstracted to many users. So, we have this window of explanation.

Description in Dr. DE - Drilling Engineering Toolbox | Pegasus Vertex, Inc.

It is not quite insightful as the title of this article, but it visualizes the table, just as the sentence elevates the sensation.

We are making our software sophisticated yet simple to use. By doing so, not only do we liberate drilling engineers from problems, but also bring smiles to their faces.