Seminar presentation based on technologies and advancements in the oil and gas field. Oil and Gas industry is one of the core fields of chemical engineering studies.

1. NEW TECHNOLOGIES IN
THE OIL AND GAS
INDUSTRY
Muhammed Thameem
B170797CH

2. CONTENTS
• SOURCES OF OIL AND GAS
• STAGES IN THE OIL AND GAS PRODUCTION
• EXPLORATION TECHNOLOGIES
• DRILLING TECHNOLOGIES
• PRODUCTION ENHANCEMENT TECHNOLOGIES
• FRACKING
• MISCELLANEOUS

3. SOURCES OF OIL AND GAS
• Oil and gas are found in organic rich sedimentary rocks
called the source rock.
• The source rock must be situated at a temperature range between
600 C and 1600C in order to release oil and gas.
• Oil and gas migrate to the upper layers through narrow pathways
and gets stored in another rock called the reservoir rock.

4. STAGES IN THE OIL AND GAS PRODUCTION
EXPLORATION
• The exploration techniques aims to locate the source rocks
and the reservoir rock at a given location.
• Most common methods used in this stage are magnetic
prospecting, gravimetric prospecting and seismic prospecting.
• The exploration stage is the most crucial stage in the whole
oil and gas production cycle.
DRILLING
• Once the exploration stage is successful, the next stage
is drilling the prospect field.
• Drilling is a technologically demanding process and various
technologies are implemented to make this
easy

5. PRODUCTION AND REFINING
• Once the drilling is completed a production, plant is built
above the drilling well.
• The crude is transferred to the refining plant to remove the impurities.
• A distillation column is at the centre of the refining plant , which
separates The crude to useful products namely, LPG , Naphtha,
Kerosene, Diesel and Heavy fuel.
TRANSPORT
• Transmission pipelines are used to carry the crude to the
Refinery, large crude oil storage site or to a seaport.
• At the seaport the crude oil is loaded to large oil tankers
For long distance transport such as international transport.
• Once the transmission pipeline reach the destination, it then
Divides to distribution pipelines for final distribution.

6. EXPLORATION TECHNOLOGIES

7. GEOLOGICAL PROSPECTING
• Prior to the advanced techniques, a series of surface
level studies are carried out as starter to the exploration
process.
• These studies include petro chemistry, geochemistry,
Stratigraphy, lithology…etc.
• Geological prospecting only gives us a surface level
knowledge about what possibly lies under the surface.
MAGNETOMETRIC PROSPECTING
• Magnetic prospecting is used to picturise the subsurface
mineral make up of the surveying region.
• Earth’s local magnetic field depends on the mineral
deposits of the surveying region
• Therefore, by calculating the earth local magnetic fields
At each points of the region , the ore composition of the
Field could be determined

8. GRAVIMETRIC PROSPECTING
• The local gravitational force depends on the density of
of the rocks present underneath the earth surface.
• Studying the local gravity at each points of the
prospecting field helps to determine the density of various
rocks present in the subsurface.
• By studying the gravity data of the region, the geophysicist
or geologist can picturise a density data of the region.
• The most important exploratory tool to study the earth sub
layers.
• In land, trucks carrying vibrators are used to create seismic
waves and
geophones are installed on the earth surface to collect
the reflected waves.
• By studying the time elapsed between the initiation of the
wave
SEISMIC PROSPECTING

9. OFF SHORE SEISMIC PROSPECTING
• Before off shore surveying begins, safety precautions
are taken to protect marine life.
• Off shore seismic surveying uses compressed air
released to the to the water to create sound waves that
penetrates deep into the subsurface layers of the earth.
• A surveying ship sends compressed air at regular
intervals
• The ship is followed buy a large array of sound sensors
which measures how long it takes for the sound waves to
bounce back from the layers of rock under the sea floor.

10. DRILLING TECHNOLOGIES
VERTICAL DRILLING
• Vertical drilling is the conventional method of drilling.
• Vertical wells of circular cross section are drilled using
excavation techniques
• Vertical wells are more expensive and have very low
success rate
HORIZONTAL DRILLING
• Initially vertical wells are drilled until the well reaches a
given depth, after then the well bends 900 and moves
Horizontally towards the oil and gas source.
• Initial cost for horizontal drilling is higher than the
vertical drilling, however the success rate is much
higher for horizontal drilling compared to the former

11. DIRECTIONAL DRILLING
• Initially the bore is drilled vertically up to a specified
depth.
• From then, the pipe is bend towards the direction of the
location of the reservoir rock.
• Extended reach drilling is used when the oil reservoir is
situated very far from the drill location.
• The Rotary Steering System is used for controlling the
direction of the hole for such large distance without
compromising on efficiency of drilling.
• The extended reach drilling is used when there are
legal constrains for drilling at the exact spot of the
reservoir location
EXTENDED REACH DRILLING

12. MULTI-LATERAL DRILLING
• Sometimes oil and natural gas reserves are located in
separate layers underground and multilateral drilling
allows producers to branch out from the main well to
tap reserves at different depths.
• This increases production from a single well and
reduces the number of wells drilled on the surface.
• A multilateral well is a single well with one or more
wellbore branches radiating from the main borehole.
RISKS OF MULTI-LATERAL DRILLING
• Borehole instability.
• stuck pipe and problems with over pressured zones.
• casing, cementing and branching problems.

13. MULTI-LATERAL DRILLING VERTICAL DRILLING

14. AUTOMATION
• Automatic drilling technology can reduce number of on-
site workers at oil rig.
• The on-site drilling works requires laborious efforts and
are highly dangerous for health and safety.
• More efficient and safer
• Highly economical for drilling multiple wells.
ADVANTAGES
DISADVANTAGES
• The job opportunities at the drilling sector will
eventually decrease.
• Instead of rig roughnecks, workers will be hired for
controlling the advanced automatic technology.

15. PRESENT FUTURE

16. SHELL’S SCADA DRILL
• Royal Dutch Shell developed automated drilling
technology called SCADAdrill.
• Once the system is mechanized and some initial
information like torque, weight…etc. are set to the
system, the system can drill the well on it’s own.
• Although it is capable of working without human
supervision, SCADAdrill allows well engineers to
monitor the rig remotely. If necessary, control can be
taken over from the machine.
WALKING RIGS
• The oil rigs that can walk on its own shoes.
• Rig mobility system allows the operator to move the rig
in different directions without a complete dismantle and
reassembly, saving tens of thousands of dollars in lost
time and additional costs

17. A WALKING RIG IN ACTION

18. PRODUCTION ENHANCEMENT TECHNOLOGIES
• The oil production capacity of the well gradually decline over
time.
• To utilize the most most out of a well, oil recovery
measures are followed.
PRIMARY METHOD
• Separating oil from the sedimentary grains
• 10% to 15% additional oil is recovered using this
method
SECONDARY METHOD
• An additional well is drilled nearby to the original well.
• Water or natural gas is pumped through the new well,
which in turn will push the trapped oil and gas towards
original oil rig.

19. TERTIARY METHOD
CO2 ENHANCED OIL RECOVERY
• Water and CO2 are injected into the reservoir
• CO2 is miscible with oil , therefore CO2 gets mixed
with oil.
• This reduces the viscosity of the oil and allows
more easier flow of oil through narrow pathways.
• Water pushes the oil towards the well , and enhanced
oil recovery will be achieved.
• In addition to other recovery methods, co2 injection
methods provides an additional 5-10% oil recovery.

20. FRACKIN
G
• Hydraulic fracturing or fracking is used for the recovery
of natural gas
• Porous rock is fractured using water, sand and chemicals
in order to release the enclosed natural gas.
• The fluid used for fracking amounts to 8 million liters of
water, tones of sand and 200,000 liters of chemicals.
• After recovering the natural gas, the fracking fluid is pumped
back into deep layers of earth and sealed in there.
• Therefore, fracking imposes a high risk on safety drinking
water.

21. GasFrac
• Instead of water, GASFRAC relies on a thick propane gel.
• Unlike water, the gel reverts to vapor before returning to the
surface - along with the natural gas.
• As an added benefit, the returning propane does not carry
drilling chemicals back to the surface.
• Propane fracking is more efficient because it allows more
gas to flow from wells than water-based fracturing.
• the propane gas that emerges from a well after it has been
fracked can be cleaned and either reused or sold.
DISADVANTAGES
• It is explosive, and requires special equipment to be
handled properly.
• Expensive compared to water.

22. MISCELLANEOUS
ARTIFICIAL INELLIGENCE
1. Detecting Oil Seeps With AI-Powered Robots – ExxonMobil and MIT
• Naturally occurring oil seeps from the seafloor are the
largest source of oil entering the world’s oceans.
• AI-powered robots will be able to detect these oil seeps in
order to greatly reduce exploration risk.
• Approximately 160,000 tones of petroleum enter North
American waters through natural seeps each year

23. 2. Precision Drilling With Machine Learning Algorithms – Shell
• A machine learning model is trained on historical data
from Shell’s extensive drilling records, as well as
simulations to steer the drill into the subsurface
• It also takes into account data from seismic surveys,
temperature, pressure, and other data points from the drill bit.
• The AI generates best possible choice of action and passes
it to the geosteerer.
• The geosteerer can accept or reject the choice given by the AI.
• The acceptance or rejection serve as an input to the AI and
the AI will make further choices so as to maximise the
acceptance rate.

24. 3. Optimizing Subsurface Data Analysis – Total S.A. and Google Cloud
• TOTAL partnering with Google, developed AI
solutions
that can interpret the subsurface data.
• large amount of exploratory data will be fed to the
AI.
• The AI can predict the possible presence of oil and
gas
based on the big data fed to the system
• Their technologies will make it possible to interpret
subsurface images from seismic studies using
computer vision technology.

25. DRONES
• Drones are extensively used in process industries
for inspection and maintenance .
• Routine inspections with drones are highly
Economical.
• Moreover, it prevents endangerment of employees
performing inspections.
• Drones these days are equipped with infrared cameras
Which can creates thermal imaging of a whole industry.
• Thermal imaging helps in detecting small temperature
Variations, thus can detect leaks in pipelines.

26. THANK YOU