In the Stabroek Block of Guyana, EMGL sought a high volume of rotary sidewall samples from a deepwater well with difficult coring conditions, including abrasive geologic features and high overbalance. To overcome this challenge, a reliable sidewall coring solution was required.
EMGL partnered with SLB to develop, test, and choose SureRock enhanced sidewall coring solution as its primary rotary coring service. The solution can recover cores in many extreme conditions and is therefore particularly suited to Guyana, which presents challenging coring conditions. The SureRock solution became the key enabler to avoid drilling a bypass well for whole core.
Additionally, SLB used an advanced digital workflow designed for identifying abrasive zones from borehole images captured by Quanta Geo™ photorealistic reservoir geology service. This enabled EMGL and SLB to intelligently relocate core depths away from these zones by resequencing cores. With this strategy to guide the sidewall coring program, SLB extended the longevity of the SureRock solution’s motor and bit by cutting less difficult cores before tackling the more challenging cores subsequently in the program.
Using advanced digital capabilities and insights from nearby wells, SLB established an efficient coring strategy that acquired 118 exceptional sidewall cores out of 123 cores attempted for a recovery rate of 96% in only two runs. The retrieved samples were of pristine quality, fully meeting all requirements for advanced rock analysis. The SureRock solution provided EMGL with the confidence to decide against drilling a bypass well. Because of this, EMGL saved 15 days of rig time, avoiding 286 metric tons of related CO2 emissions.
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cores cut leveraging the state‑of‑the‑art coring BHA68
cores recovered using the high‑resolution in situ core detection measurements118
cores recovered using the SureRock solution's hardware and automation
