re: Relief wells ... feasible to drill at

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Well then by all means we should double the risks, costs of drilling, and equipment/people requirements by drilling two potential blowouts instead of just one. It would be great for me, I could retire way earlier.

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Did you even read my original post? I said it could be pulled off but would be a very dumb and costly route to go.

No company would drill under those circumstances thats why a regulation like that would never pass.

Since there is finally some other industry guys around, what have yall heard as for as any of the new regs? What do you think some will be? Double BOPs is a for sure I would think.

Been busy as of late, is there a diffident that a bad cement job was at play?

i'd say it actually isn't feasible to do it right. most arguing for this are assuming the only place a well will blow out is at TD, and that's simply not the case. the relief well has to be planned to intersect the well at the appropriate depth based on where the kick is. if you're planning to drill to 25,000', but take a massive thousands of feet above that, your relief well that's drilling next to you will require significant backing up and possibly a total redesign in order to accomplish the task.

when you're drilling an exploration well, oftentimes you're lucky to have another well within 10 miles of your current location against which to compare the seismic data interpretation. you have a decent idea what you're drilling, but until you actually drill the footage you know nothing for certain.

furthermore, a relief well would typically be spudded 3000-5000' away from the subject well based on the prevailing winds and seas. however, in an exploration mode, that 3000-5000' distance can produce a remarkably different drilling environment with totally different hazards of its own. you're essentially doubling your risk of experiencing a severe well control incident while trying to mitigate an infinitessimally small event from happening.

is it technically feasible? yeah, i guess so, but so is a lot of stuff that doesn't make sense. a more prudent approach would be to submit a detailed proposal for a relief well along w/ the permit application in addition to proving the necessary equipment is available in inventory plus a plan to move a rig on location ASAP if necessary.

and let us not forget that the vast majority of blowouts result from workover & completion activity -- not drilling. so what would those arguing in favor of this propose in light of that? does every producing well ever drilled now require a new relief well? that's the logical end of the argument.

I'm on the same side if the fence as you here. Yes it is technically feasible to do, but an idiotic approach to this situation. There are alot of unknowns and there would be almost no way to get it right. I think that this is all lsugradman wanted to here, so he feels like he won his ridiculous argument.

You explained it very well