Research and development on foam breaking and recycling technology in air-foam drilling

In recent years,air-foam combining the advantages of both liquid and air drilling has been utilized as a drilling medium. Air-foam drilling has proved its efficiency in numerous situations where serious problems were encountered,such as in fractured formations and depleted or high permeable zones. However,the major disadvantage of air-foam drilling system is that the foam can only be used once,so that an extremely large pit is required to contain the foam to allow sufficient room for cuttings and for the foam to dissipate. Moreover,it needs enormous volume prepared,consuming abundance of water and ingredient additives,which results in the high cost of foam drilling. The recycling foam fluid by using foam breaking technology is the only effective method to solve these problems associated with the known foam drilling. Various types of equipment and technique have been employed to suppress foam formation in biological and process equipment in foam drilling. The study described various methods of foam breaking technology,and the trend of the foam breaking technology for foam drilling is discussed.

Microwave propagation in air drilling

This paper examines the feasibility in air drilling of transmitting down-hole signals by using microwaves. Firstly the basic theory of microwave propagation in the drill-pipe or casing was studied, including power loss, cutoff wavelength, and dust scattering. Theoretical analysis indicates that the microwave propagation distance in a cb214mm casing can easily reach 5,000 m. When the effect of dust particles is taken into account, the propagation distance decreases to 2,000 m. We conducted both laboratory experiments and field tests in casings commonly used in oil fields. The field tests show that the effective propagation distance of microwave in the casing is about 1,300 m. The experimental results do not match well with theoretical prediction, but are acceptable. In future commercial applications, by applying multiple relay amplifiers, the microwave propagation distance could be long enough for most drilling wells.

Relationship between Formation Water Rate,Equivalent Penetration Rate and Volume Flow Rate of Air in Air Drilling

Formation water invasion is the most troublesome problem associated with air drilling. However, it is not economical to apply mist drilling when only a small amount of water flows into wellbore from formation during air drilling. Formation water could be circulated out of the wellbore through increasing the gas injection rate. In this paper, the Angel model was modified by introducing Nikurade friction factor for the flow in coarse open holes and translating formation water rate into equivalent penetration rate. Thus the distribution of annular pressure and the relationship between minimum air injection rate and formation water rate were obtained. Real data verification indicated that the modified model is more accurate than the Angel model and can provide useful information for air drilling.

Critical condition study of borehole stability during air drilling

The purpose of this paper is to establish the existence of the critical condition of borehole stability during air drilling. Rock Failure Process Analysis Code 20 was used to set up a damage model of the borehole excavated in strain-softening rock. Damage evolution around the borehole was studied by tracking acoustic emission. The study indicates that excavation damaged zone （EDZ） is formed around borehole because of stress concentration after the borehole is excavated. There is a critical condition for borehole stability; the borehole will collapse when the critical damage condition is reached. The critical condition of underground excavation exists not only in elastic and ideal plastic material but in strainsoftening material as well. The research is helpful to developing an evaluation method of borehole stability during air drilling.

Hole Cleaning Prediction in Foam Drilling Using Artificial Neural Network and Multiple Linear Regression

Foam drilling is increasingly used to develop low pressure reservoirs or highly depleted mature reservoirs because of minimizing the formation damage and potential hazardous drilling problems. Prediction of the cuttings concentration in the wellbore annulus as a function of operational drilling parameters such as wellbore geometry, pumping rate, drilling fluid rheology and density and maximum drilling rate is very important for optimizing these parameters. This paper describes a simple and more reliable artificial neural network (ANN) method and multiple linear regression (MLR) to predict cuttings concentration during foam drilling operation. This model is applicable for various borehole conditions using some critical parameters associated with foam velocity, foam quality, hole geometry, subsurface condition (pressure and temperature) and pipe rotation. The average absolute percent relative error (AAPE) between the experimental cuttings concentration and ANN model is less than 6%, and using MLR, AAPE is less than 9%. A comparison of the ANN and mechanistic model was done. The AAPE values for all datasets in this study were 3.2%, 8.5% and 10.3% for ANN model, MLR model and mechanistic model respectively. The results show high ability of ANN in prediction with respect to statistical methods.

FGC-15D large-diameter DTH air hammer drilling system and its application in offshore rock-socketed pile hole drilling

In the past two decades, numerous large-diameter rock-socketed piles were constructed in China to support foundations of skyscrapers, great bridges or to retain soil in potential geological hazard areas. However, drilling large-diameter rock-socketed pile holes with conventional drilling method such as rotary drilling or cable tool drilling is time-consuming and the cost is usually very high. In order to drill large-diameter rocksocketed pile holes faster at relatively low cost, the FGC15A large-diameter DTH air hammer drilling system was developed in 1987 and was given the second-clasa award by Ministry of Geology and Mineral Resources in 1991. Since it was innovated the drilling system has been used in more than twenty important and tough pro- jects on land, and wonderful results were acquired. At the same time the large-diameter DTH air hammer drilling system was improved continuously. The FGC15D is the latest version of the technique.

Analysis of effects of operating parameters on rate of penetration in drilling process with air down-the-hole hammer

Air down-the-hole(DTH)hammer drilling has long been recognized to have the potential of drilling faster than conventional rotary drill,especially in some hard rocks such as granite,sandstone,limestone,dolomite,etc.with the same weight on bit(WOB)and rotations per minute(RPM).So,it has been widely used in many drilling fields including mineral resource exploration drilling,oil and gas drilling and geothermal drilling.In order to reduce drilling cost by selecting optimal drilling parameters,rate of penetration(ROP)should be estimated accurately and the effects of different factors on ROP should be analyzed.In this research,ANN model with several multi-layer perception back propagation(BP)networks for predicting ROP of air DTH hammer drilling was developed using controllable parameters such as impact energy,impact frequency,WOB,RPM and bit operating time for the formations with a certain drillability index of rock.Several BP neural networks with the different neurons in hidden layers were developed and compared for selecting optimal architecture of ANN.The effects of the drilling parameters such as impact energy,impacting frequency,WOB,RPM and bit operating time on the ROP of air DTH hammer drilling were investigated by trained ANN.From the analyses,the optimum range of drilling parameters for providing high ROP were determined and analyzed for a formation with a certain drillability index of rock.The methodology proposed in this study can be used in many mathematical problems for optimization of drilling process with air DTH hammer.

Reliability analysis of retractable drill bit with air reverse circulation used for drilling while casing

Casing-while-drilling(CWD)with down the hole(DTH)hammer drilling technology has been widely used in unconsolidated formations,due to its advantages in protecting the borehole wall,excellent rock cuttings capacity,and fast penetration rate in hard rock.As an important component of the CWD system,the structure of the retractable drill bit needs not only to ensure to form stronger reverse circulation,but also to be expandable or retractable as needed,otherwise the drill bit cannot be lift and put down smoothly in the casing,and may lead to drilling accidents.This paper developed a new type of reverse circulation DTH hammer drill bit used for CWD drilling technology.The retractable performance of this type of drill bit is studied using ADAMS software.The results show that it is smoothly expandable and retractable as designed under the conditions of the weight of the bit(WOB)of 0.5–2.0 t and the rotation speed of 30–60 r/min.To investigate the reverse circulation effect of the drill bit,Fluent software was used to simulate the flow characteristic inside it.The simulation results indicated that it can form strong reverse circulation,and the entrainment ratio h can reach 9.5%.

Method for predicting cuttings transport using artificial neural networks in foam drilling

Foam is used widely in underbalanced drilling for oil and gas exploration to improve well perfor-mance.Accurate prediction of the cutting transport and pressure loss in the foam drilling is an important way to prevent stuck pipe,lost circulation and to increase the rate of penetration(ROP).In foam drilling,the cuttings transport quality may be defined in terms of cuttings consistency and downhole pressure loss,which are controlled by many factors.Therefore,it is very difficult to establish the mathematical equation that reflects nonlinear relationship among various factors.The field and experimental measurements of these parameters are time consuming and costly.In this study,the authors suggest a cuttings transport mathematical modeling using BPN(back propagation network),RBFN(radial basis function network)and GRNN(general regression neural network)based on various experiment data of cuttings transport of previous researchers and compared the result with experiment data.Results of this study show that the GRNN has a correlation coefficient of 0.99962 and an average error of 0.15 in training datasets,and a correlation coefficient of 0.99881 and an average error of 0.612 in testing datasets,which has higher accuracy and faster training velocity than the BP network or RBFN network.GRNN can be used in many mathematical problems for accurate estimation of cuttings consistency and downhole pressure loss instead of field and experimental measurements for hydraulic design in foam drilling operation.

Application of micro-foam drilling fluid technology in Haita area

In recent years, a new kind of drilling fluid system with unique structure micro-foam has been developed. Compared with other drilling fluid systems, it possesses many advantages. And it has been successfully applied in hundreds of wells to drill depleted reservoirs in the world wide. The geological structure is very complex in Haita area, it is difficult to achieve the requirement of increasing drilling rate by conventional drilling methods, even can’t make footage. The micro-foam drilling fluid can apply to Haita area, and solve the drilling problems commendably, which is comprehended by studying the structure and plugging, prevent caving, speed mechanism of the micro-foam drilling fluid. Field practice indicates that micro-foam drilling fluid technology can resolve the drilling problem effectively in Haita basin. It has the extremely vital significance to improve drilling speed, discover and protect reservoir stratum, decrease the risk of circulation loss and save the drilling cost.

Experimental Study of Compressed Air Foam System and Its Foam Rheology

The paper described a newly developed high performance compressed air foam system(CAFS). The effective system generates uniform foam w ith greater momentum by injecting compressed air into flowing foam solution. Foa m generated by this system presented superior viscous and wetting properties to water.A pendulum system was designed to measure yield stress of foam. The results pro ved the existence of yield stress of foam. And the increasing tendency of yield stress with gas fraction and bubble size has also been found out.

New development of theories in gas drilling

Theories established from engineering fundamentals have been of great value in supporting the design and execution of drilling operations in gas drilling where gas is used as a drilling fluid.This work presents an overview of new theories developed in recent years for special gas drilling operations including horizontal wells.These new theories are found in the areas of gas-mixture flow hydraulics in deviated and horizontal boreholes,hole cleaning of solids accumulation,hole cleaning of formation water,flow diverging for washout control,bit orifice optimization,and depression of formation water influx.This paper provides drilling engineers with updated mathematical models and methods for optimizing design to improve gas drilling performance.

Treatment of Benzene,Toluene and Xylene Contaminated Air in a Bioactive Foam Emulsion Reactor

A novel bioactive foam emulsion bioreactor for benzene,toluene and xylene(BTX)contaminated air streams treatment has been developed.The gas-liquid interfacial area by biocompatible foam and driving force for mass transfer by a water immiscible organic phase were increased in this reactor.The effect of several parameters such as gas residence time,oxygen content,and organic phase concentration on bioreactor performance was studied. Experimental results showed an average elimination capacity(EC)of 220 g·m3·h -1with removal efficiency(RE) of 89.59%for BTX inlet concentration of 1 g·m3at 15 s gas residence time in the bioreactor.The statistical developed model predicted that the maximum elimination capacity of the reactor for BTX could be reached to 423.45 g·m3·h -1.Continues operation of the bioreactor with high EC and RE was demonstrated by optimizing the operational parameters of the bioreactor.Overall the results suggest that the bioreactor developed can be very effective systems to treat BTX vapors.

Experimental research on inorganic solidified foam for sealing air leakage in coal mines

In order to efficiently seal air leakages and control spontaneous combustion of coal, solidified foam was developed by adding a certain compound additive to fly coal ash and cement as the main materials. It was prepared basing on the foaming characteristic through physical and mechanical system. We studied the effects of the different types of foaming agents, the mass ratio of cement to fly ash, and the mass ratio of solid to water and content of cellulose on the performance of solidified foam. The results show that when adding the composite protein, surfactant and cellulose foaming agents. The cement-fly ash ratio of 0.75:1, the water solid ratio as large as 2:1, and the solidified foam with high properties and density of only 516 kg/m 3 and compressive strength of up to 12.68 MPa were prepared. But the initial setting time, identity and compressive strength may be changed by varying the water solid ratio and/or the additives. We theoretically analyzed the influence mechanism of foam density, compressive strength and water solid ratio. The solidified foam is especially suitable for sealing surface leakage channels and filling the goaf with a wide application prospects.

Scalable and Heavy Foam Functionalization by Electrode-Inspired Sticky Jammed Fluids for Efficient Indoor Air-Quality Management

Functionalization of polymer foams by surface coating is of great interest for advanced flow-interactive materials working with well-controlled 3D open channels.However,realizing heavy functional coating via a fast and recyclable way remains a big challenge.Here,inspired by the battery electrodes,we propose a scalable mechanic-assisted heavy coating strategy based on the design of sticky jammed fluid(SJF)to conquer the above challenge.Similar to the electrode slurry,the SJF is dominated by a high concentration of active material(≥20 wt%of active carbon,for instance)uniformly dispersed in a protein binder solution.Due to the sticky and solidrich nature of the SJF,one can realize a high coating efficiency of 60 wt%gain per coating.The critical factors controlling the coating processing and quality are further identified and discussed.Furthermore,the functionalized foam is demonstrated as a high-performance shape-customizable toxic gas remover,which can absorb formaldehyde very efficiently at different circumstances,including static adsorption,flow-based filtration,and source interception.Finally,the foam skeleton and the active materials are easily recycled by a facile solvent treatment.This study may inspire new scalable way for fast,heavy,and customizable functionalization of polymeric foams.

A new design of foaming agent mixing device for a pneumatic foaming system used for mine dust suppression

To overcome the drawbacks of the conventional foam technology used for dust suppression,including large pressure loss,high water pressure and low driving pressure,a new pneumatic foaming system is introduced.Then an original design of foaming agent mixing device is proposed,and its performance is investigated and evaluated under different pressure compensations.Experimental results show that the maximum absorption amount increases by 2.9-6.7 times at a pressure compensation of 0.04-0.2 MPa compared with no pressure compensation.The pressure loss and pressure fluctuation both reduce significantly with increasing pressure compensation.The critical outlet pressure increases by30.4-240%.Field application indicates that the proposed mixing device ensures the reliable addition of foaming agent used for foam dust suppression.The effect of foam on dust suppression is remarkable,and the economic cost of foam is low.Therefore,there is reason to believe that the new mixing device will greatly promote foam technology to be widely used for suppressing dust in underground coal mines.

Research on experiment and calculation of foam bursting device

This research presents experimental data on mechanical foam bursting device,based on the high speed of air fluid impinging insidethe foam bursting device,foam bubbles disrupted as a consequence of pressures changed very quickly as shear force and their impact forces.Experimental data on foam-bursting capacity have been presented.Designed device can provide effective foam bursting on collapse foam.

微气泡驱与空气泡沫驱技术差异性及调整对策

微气泡驱与空气泡沫驱技术经过矿场试验,在低渗高含水率油藏具有较强的适应性,但对于两种气驱机理认识及技术政策调整思路方式上仍存在短板。本文通过深入研究两种气驱技术机理、驱替特征的差异性,结合现场动态调整效果,认为微气泡驱以物理发泡为主,驱替特征呈气液同驱,采取低气液比(1.0∶3.0)的技术政策,空气泡沫驱以化学发泡为主,驱替特征呈气驱为主液相为辅,采取高气液比(3.0∶1.0)的调整思路,并提出了气驱分注试验的调整对策,控水增油效果显著提升,提高采收率趋势良好。对同类油藏两种气驱技术调整界限具有一定的借鉴指导意义。

压缩空气泡沫系统射流运动控制抗风特性研究

压缩空气泡沫灭火系统近年来快速发展,而压缩空气泡沫中的喷射运动控制是影响其能否有效灭火的重要因素之一。针对目前缺乏高风速条件下,对压缩空气泡沫消防炮进行射流偏差抗风研究,以及泡沫炮无法实现精准灭火的问题,文中提出一种考虑自然风条件的压缩空气泡沫消防炮射流运动模型,结合压缩空气泡沫灭火系统气液比调节控制,设计了可根据外界风速风向自适应动态调节泡沫炮水平俯角的抗风控制系统,提高系统的抗风能力。基于SimuLink软件搭建射流运动模型,并在自然风工况下进行系统抗风能力喷射试验,试验表明:系统可根据风速风向信息进行抗风动作,使泡沫炮射流落点达到指定区域,证明了所提泡沫炮射流运动模型的准确性及控制系统抗风能力的有效性,为压缩空气泡沫消防炮在大风恶劣条件下进行有效灭火提供了切实可行的抗风方案。

综放面采空区漏风规律及防治技术研究

综放工作面采空区漏风易导致遗煤自燃,危及矿井安全。以大南湖一矿1305综放工作面为研究背景,采用数值模拟和现场试验的方法,研究了综放工作面采空区漏风规律,提出了综放工作面端头封堵采空区防漏风技术方案,并在现场进行了试验。结果表明,工作面端头是综放工作面采空区漏风的主要通道,其中进风巷侧端头漏风率达19%;风流在采空区内渗透深度约160 m;工作面端头封堵后,风流在采空区内渗透深度缩减至100 m左右;1305综放工作面端头封堵后,采空区漏风率降低17个百分点。