The Main Progress Of Russian Turbine Drilling Technology And Its Application In China

It is an eternal topic for petroleum engineering field to improve the drilling speed andthen improve the progress of reservoir exploration and development and economic efficiency.As drilling cost occupies a large share in petroleum exploration and development cost, variousoil and gas drilling service companies take it as an important task to constantly improve thetechnical level and enhance market competition ability. With perfect design, advancedtechnology and strict management, foreign drilling technology is constantly refreshed with afaster speed, less accidents and high efficiency of deep drilling. How to improve the drillingspeed of deep wells and ultra deep wells is still one of the biggest technical problems in oiland gas well engineering.Currently the most widely-used downhole motor both at home and abroad are theturbinedrill and positive displacement mud motor. Turbinedrill drilling is an advanced drillingmethod. Turbinedrill can be used to drill on the bottom of the hole to take the heart. Itsrotation is not like positive displacement mud motor by the pressure of the liquid, but drivenby liquid flow. Because drill pipe does not rotate, working conditions of drilling pipe can beimproved significantly. Besides, the power consumption that is required when rotating drillcolumn can be eliminated.Turbinedrill can be combined with roller bit, diamond bit to drill vertical hole,directional hole and multi-bottom hole, but the defect are high rotate speed, low torque, shortbearing life, quick-wear parts and shorter bit life.In order to overcome the drawbacks of the traditional turbo drills, Russia has developedmany new turbo drills, such as turbo drills with multiple turbine sections, low speed hightorque turbo drill, turbo drill with decelerator, turbo drill with rotating shell, etc. Sinceinvented in the Former Soviet Union, turbo-drilling has always been an effective andeconomical drilling method in Russia. With quick development in the past several decades,the properties and structures of turbo drills have received continuous improvement, whichbasically meets the needs of drilling techniques. What’s more, the drilling footage of theturbo-drilling accounts for more than80percent of the whole drilling footage. Compared withour country, the turbo-drilling techniques in Russia are more mature.With the expansion of exploration, our country is confronted with more complexgeologic conditions and the consequent more serious problems of drilling techniques. With an attempt to speed up the exploration, every oil field company has began to carry out variousturbo-drilling tests, which, to some extent, have accelerated the exploration speed. However,accompanying problems such as unsteady speed effect, unsatisfactory economic benefits andinchoate complete techniques also exist. Therefore, we should continue the research anddevelopment of turbo drills and turbo-drilling techniques, strengthen the application ofcomposite drilling techniques of turbo drills, especially in the deep and ultra-deep welldrilling, we should actively learn the advantages of Russian turbo drill and its turbine drillingtechnology, and accelerate our pace of reaching the international level in this field.