ConocoPhillips sets drilling records

Kristen Nelson

Petroleum News

ConocoPhillips Alaska has set North American and Alaska drilling records at the CD5 drill site in the Colville River unit. The company said April 10 that its CD5-25 well set the North American land-based well drilling record for the longest horizontal lateral, 21,748 feet. The well was drilled by Doyon Rig 19.

The well has a true vertical depth of some 7,900 feet and the record-setting lateral was drilled in the Alpine A sand.

The company also set two state of Alaska records at the well: for total combined lateral length and total combined footage for a well. The combined length of the two laterals, in the Alpine A sand and Alpine C sand, was 34,211 feet. The total combined footage for the well was a state record at 42,993 feet, the company said.

“Improved technology like extended reach drilling and multi-lateral wells allow ConocoPhillips to maximize production while minimizing our environmental footprint,” said Shon Robinson, manager of drilling and wells for ConocoPhillips Alaska. “CD5-25 will produce from over 4 miles of reservoir in the long lateral and from over 6 miles of reservoir when both laterals are included. Innovation and teamwork were a huge part of safely drilling this well,” he said.

CD5 is the first commercial oil development on Alaska Native lands within the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, the company said. Production began from CD5 in late 2015. The original production target was 16,000 barrels per day; the field as averaged 37,000 bpd. The company said the significant increase in production at CD5 is due in part to wells like CD5-25.

ConocoPhillips said Doyon 19 moved to the Greater Moose’s Tooth 1 drill site in NPR-A in mid-March to begin drilling that project’s first well. GMT1 is expected to come online in late 2018 and peak at some 30,000 bpd.

In 2016 ConocoPhillips Alaska set a record for the longest well ever drilled in Alaska at CD5 with an injection well, also drilled by Doyon 19, with a measured depth of 26,196 feet and a vertical depth of some 7,400 feet; the well included a horizontal section of 17,228 feet.

CD5 was planned for 15 wells, but the company said in 2016 that based on results from the first 10 wells, 18 more would be added, bringing the total to 33 wells.

ConocoPhillips Alaska spokeswoman Natalie Lowman told Petroleum News in an April 10 email that there have been two separate extension projects at CD5, the first from 15 to 33 wells, completed in the past winter season, and a second extension from 33 to 43 wells which will occur in 2019. She said the increase in well count represents an incremental gross investment of $430 million in addition to the initial invest of $1.1 billion gross.

“The increase in increase in well count does not require any increase in gravel footprint,” Lowman said.

- KRISTEN NELSON