Well integrity management—a progressive approach to a major industry challenge

Abstract

Integrity of the well and well system is of paramount importance, it is central to safe operation of any oil and gas facility and to the corporate and social reputation of the licenced operator to being a competent party to operate these facilities. Indeed, NOPSEMA’s mission statement is to independently and professionally regulate offshore safety, well integrity and environmental management. This extended abstract highlights the importance of data as being core to knowledge and assurance of well integrity: what to monitor, how to manage that data and ultimately how to interpret that data to determine the well condition and to ensure the safe operation of the wells. This extended abstract uses case studies that include more than 2,000 wells distributed across multiple operators, multiple fields, multiple countries and multiple continents. Each has a unique story; however, a common element is the management of data spread across multiple third-party data systems, which have been successfully integrated in each case. More challenging is the range of data analysis and presentations customised for each client to achieve their goal of safe well operation. Examples of the data analysis and presentations include risk evaluation against complex criteria in individual well failure matrices, determination of tubing condition based on varying production conditions, managing well safe operating limits and determining mean time to failure of equipment to establish risk-based inspection frequencies.