DEPARTMENTS • DRILLING AHEAD
DRILLINGCONTRACTOR.ORG VIRTUAL PANEL DISCUSSIONS
VPDS “Optimizing Downhole
Drilling for Peak
Performance and
Reservoir Insight”
A IR DAT E: 24 AUGUS T 2 0 2 3
@ 9:00 HOUS T ON (GM T-5 )
Learn how SLB is leading the
performance assurance charge
— evolving drilling by combining
its latest drill bit technologies,
rotary steering systems and
autonomous controls. These are
crucial advances for building wells
in the most efficient and consistent
manner and enhancing real-time
reservoir characterization for more
precise trajectories that elevate well
performance. On 24 August 9:00 CDT, Drilling
Contractor will host a live Virtual
Panel Discussion, sponsored by SLB:
• Wiley Long, SLB Product
Champion PDC Bits, will discuss
the evolution of Smith Bits drill bits
• Roberta Santana, SLB Product
Champion PDC Bits, will
highlight the SnapScan app and
dull-grading digitalization
• Ziad Akkaoui, SLB Digital
Champion, will detail
autonomous downhole tools
• Stephen Whitfield, Drilling
Contractor Associate Editor
(moderator) Sponsored
by drillingcontractor.org/
vpd-registration- optimizing-downhole-
drilling 6
To bust the asymptote, industry may
have to fundamentally redefine safety
BY LINDA HSIEH, EDITOR & PUBLISHER
In a 2008 head-on collision between a
commuter train and a freight train in
California that resulted in mass casualties,
the ensuing NTSB investigation blamed
the incident on the commuter train’s oper-
ator. This individual caused the collision,
it was concluded, because he had been
distracted by text messages and missed
a red signal warning him from entering
a section of single track where the freight
train had been given the right of way.

That type of blame on the worker is
exactly what renowned organization-
al safety expert Todd Conklin preached
against in his talk at the recent IADC
HSE&T Conference in Houston. It was an
eye-opening speech that shed a lot of light
on the next steps that the upstream oil and
gas industry must take in order to “bust
that asymptote,” he said, quoting a former
boss at Los Alamos National Laboratory.

The industry has put in significant
efforts over the past few decades to
improve safety, resulting in a dramatic
decline in injuries and fatalities. Yet, our
safety curve has plateaued. “This is your
story of safety. You’re in a classic asymp-
totic relationship,” Dr Conklin told the con-
ference attendees. “And doing more of the
same is not getting you better results.”
To move to the next stage of its safety
journey, companies will need to think
about safety differently. First, they must
accept that every accident is not prevent-
able. “This is something the automotive
industry figured out, and you guys haven’t
made the jump yet,” he said. Accidents are
unintentional deviations from an expected
outcome, which means they’re hard to pre-
dict and, therefore, hard to prevent.

“I don’t know how we drifted over time
into this perfection model,” he said, where
companies believe “there’s a perfect work
environment and, if the worker is obedi-
ent enough, problems will go away. That’s
attractive, but it’s just wrong.” That type of
thinking also leads companies to “focus
on investigating how we failed to prevent
the accident,” rather than investigating the
accident itself. This doesn’t mean preven-
tion isn’t important, but it’s not enough.

To make the next step change in safety,
he said, companies need to start defining
safety not as the absence of accidents but
as the presence of controls, or safeguards.

The primary safety function of seat belts
in a car, for example, is to position the
humans in “survivable space,” where all
the different safety systems of the car can
function more effectively in case of a crash
– and the automotive industry designs
their cars assuming a 100% chance they
will someday get into a crash. Similarly,
the drilling industry must adopt that kind
of mindset so that “when the system inevi-
tably fails,” there are multiple layers of
safeguards built in so it can fail safely.

“The most profound message I can give
you is never have a worker one safeguard
away from a failure. You have to have mul-
tiple controls in the system.”
Dr Conklin also encouraged companies
to adopt a “deliberate strategy” to improve.

When an incident happens, “you can
choose to either blame and punish, or learn
and improve, but you don’t get to do both,”
he said. “If you choose to blame, you’re
going to shut down learning. Absolutely,
I promise you. And if you choose to learn,
then you really can’t punish.”
When investigating incidents or any
kind of operational upset, start by asking
about the “what” instead of the “who,” he
urged. Stop trying to seek behavior that
can be labeled as somehow deficient and
the cause of the problem.

“Workers are really smart, and we have
to stop seeing them as the problem and
start seeing them as the solution to draw
from,” he said. “Don’t go out and look for
places where workers deviate, because you
will always find deviation in your indus-
try. Go out and look for places where con-
trols are effective, and repeat that every
chance you get.” DC
See Page 14 for a link to watch DC’s interview
with Dr Conklin.

J U LY/AU G U ST 2023 • D R I L L I N G C O N T R AC T O R




DRILLING & COMPLETION NEWS • DEPARTMENTS
$12.7 billion Uaru development in Guyana with 10 drill centers, 44 wells gets green light
Hess Corp and ExxonMobil have made
a final investment decision to proceed
with Uaru, the fifth development on the
Stabroek Block in Guyana, after receiv-
ing government and regulatory approvals.

Uaru will have a production capacity of
approximately 250,000 gross bbl/day of oil ,
with production targeted to start in 2026.

The $12.7 billion Uaru development will
target an estimated resource base of more
than 800 million bbl of oil and include up
to 10 drill centers and 44 production and
injection wells. MODEC is constructing the
floating production, storage and offload-
ing (FPSO) vessel for Uaru, which will be
called Errea Wittu .

Guyana's Liza Phases 1 and 2 production
average d 375,000 gross bbl/day in Q1. The
third and fourth sanctioned developments ,
Payara and Yellowtail, are targeted for
startup in Q4 and in 2025, respectively . A
sixth development, Whiptail, is expected to
be submitted for government and regula-
tory approval later this year.

ADNOC Drilling to add 2 jackups to its
fleet as part of continued expansion
Equinor is planning to drill 10 new wells on the upgraded Njord .

Image source: Even Kleppa and Lizette Bertelsen/Equinor.

Equinor aims to double field life and
production from reinvigorated Njord field
The Njord field in the Norwegian Sea was officially reopened
on 15 May after extensive upgrades were made to the platform
and floating storage and offloading vessel (FSO) to double the
field's life – and more than double its production.

The Njord field started production in 1997 and was originally
supposed to produce until 2013. However, systematic work with
increased recovery means that there are still large volumes of oil
and gas left. New discoveries in the area can also be produced and
exported via Njord.

In 2016, the platform and FSO were disconnected from the field
and towed to shore for upgrades. On 27 December 2022, produc-
tion resumed from the Njord field.

“This is the first time a platform and an FSO have been discon-
nected from the field, upgraded and towed back offshore. We have
now doubled the field life,” said Grete B. Haaland, Equinor Senior
Vice President for Exploration and Production North.

Equinor says it aims to produce approximately the same vol-
ume from Njord as the company has already produced so far,
around 250 million BOE. Ten new wells will be drilled on Njord
from an upgraded drilling facility, and more exploration will be
carried out close to the field.

In addition, two new subsea fields have already been tied back
to Njord. Combined recoverable volumes from the Bauge and
Fenja fields, which both started production in April, are 110 mil-
lion BOE.

ADNOC Drilling has signed an agreement to acquire two
premium high-specification Gusto MSC CJ46 design jackups .

The rigs will be delivered into Abu Dhabi waters and become
operational during Q4 .

With this $220 million combined rig acquisition, the com-
pany will have almost doubled its jackup fleet since early 2021,
and further significant expansion is still expected from now
until the end of 2024. ADNOC Drilling's overall rig fleet has
grown from 95 in October 2021 to 115 as of 31 March.

"The acquisition of these premium jackup rigs will sup-
port one of our major customers, ADNOC Offshore, with its
drilling and completion services requirements, as it delivers
accelerated production capacity," said Abdulrahman Abdulla
Al Seiari, Chief Executive Officer of ADNOC Drilling. " These
rigs further cement our position as one of the world’s largest
offshore jackup rig fleet owners and supports our plan to grow
our overall fleet to 142 owned rigs by 2024.”
Multiple new contracts announced
for offshore rigs from Shelf, Odfjell, Stena
■ Shelf Drilling has secured a contract for the Shelf Drilling
Barsk jackup with Equinor for operations at the Sleipner Vest
field, located on the Norwegian Continental Shelf. The firm
term of the contract is two wells, approximating to 270 days.

The contract value for the firm period, excluding certain inte-
grated services, is approximately $61 million. The contract
also includes options for two additional wells, and the planned
startup of operations is between May and July 2024.

■ Separately, Shelf also secured a short-term contract for the
Adriatic I jackup for operations offshore Nigeria, with a firm
term of 90 days and an estimated contract value of $11 million,
excluding revenues for mobilization and demobilization. The
contract is scheduled to start in early May 2023
■ DNO Norge, Aker BP and Longboat Energy have contracted
Odfjell Drilling's Deepsea Yantai semisubmersible to drill
the Lotus (Kjøttkake) exploration well in Norway. Drilling is
expected to commence in Q3 2024 . Licence PL1182S lies in
the prolific Northern North Sea, 4 km southeast of the recent
Kveikje discovery .

■ Shell has contracted Stena Drilling's Stena Evolution drill-
ship to operate in the US Gulf of Mexico starting in Q2 2024 for
a primary term of five years .

D R I L L I N G C O N T R AC T O R • J U LY/AU G U ST 2023
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