Drilling Offshore Wells with HP WBM in Extreme HP HT Conditions

During drilling of three exploration wells challenging conditions encountered, such as temperatures up to 180°C, interbedded highly reactive shales/silts, formation pressures which required mud weights up to 2.35 sg and narrow margin between pore and fracture gradients, posed a host of technical, logistical and cost challenges to Eni activities. These conditions required an accurate drilling fluids design to maximize operational efficiency and to minimize the risks related to such an extreme environment. Technical demands were particularly critical since the reactive shale formations had historically proved to be difficult to inhibit when drilled with Water Based Mud and might have caused swelling, tight hole, sticky wireline runs, bit-balling and accretion that could have resulted, among other issues, in low penetration rates (ROP). The formation nature coupled with ECD (Equivalent Circulation Density) constraints due to the high mud weight required to cope with high pore pressure, which also caused high mud rheology readings, were therefore the main limits to be overcome to achieve the well objectives. A tailored drilling fluid program was thus proposed which consisted of an inhibitive HPWBM (High Performance Water Based Mud) that could be converted to an HT-HPWBM, (High Temperature-High Performances Water Based Mud) while drilling, to cross the deeper and hotter sections of the well. This fluid was specifically engineered and optimized after each well in order to contain high concentration of a combination of monovalent salts to guarantee inhibition and reduce solids loading, dedicated polyamine shale inhibitor and fluid loss additives to minimize API/HPHT filtrate and filter cake thickness with the aim to reduce shale water invasion throughout the drilling campaign, graphite to minimizes fluid invasion and fracture propagation and ROP (Rate Of Penetration) enhancer continuously injected using dedicated pump to act as anti-balling and anti-accretion additive. The achieved results were drilling targets delivered safely, on time and with good overall fluid performances which either reduced or eliminated many of the challenges seen in offset wells, including: no barite sag, rheology stability, and stable long-term mud properties and wellbore conditions even during extended formation logs acquisitions. This paper covers the design, execution and accomplishments of the water-based drilling fluids employed on three HP/HT wells drilled, together with all of the lessons learned captured, highlighting the evolution of these systems to reach a step-change in terms of performances in such a harsh environment.