Drilling Engineering Author and Mentor Meets his Students at SPE NE Section Event

Drilling Engineering Author and Mentor Meets his Students at SPE NE Section Event

SPE Northern Emirates Section (SPE NE) continued the Technical Talks series in September 2019, with Distinguished Lecturer Dr. Hussain Rabia presenting well design methods and challenges, a subject which captured the attention of many industry professionals from the SPE NE Section members. In the “Engineered Well Design: From Spud to Abandonment” presentation Dr. Rabia discussed and explained modern well design methods required throughout the life of a well from spud to abandonment, including well integrity and well control issues. The event included discussing technical and non-technical factors involved in well design, including regulatory requirements, the concept of pressure vessel, how to establish and calculate casing properties from the various industry standards (API and ISO) and how to establish the correct casing shoe strength from well integrity tests. The concept of kick tolerance (swabbed and drilling kicks) were reviewed from both, a well design aspect and a well control aspect. A review of current well design methods was done, including the important aspects of burst, collapse and tension criteria for each casing string, followed by a review of the various elements that make up the well design document (service loads, well completion, etc.) for a typical onshore and offshore well, well integrity in terms of zonal isolation, role of cement, number of barriers and testing of barriers including inflow testing and the importance and procedure for carrying out inflow testing. Finally, the importance of engineering the suspension and abandonment of wells, using current regulatory requirements has been presented.

Dr. Hussain Rabia is currently the Managing Director of Entrac Petroleum, a consulting company engaged in well design and training. A BSc First Class Honors degree in Mining and Petroleum Engineering and a PhD in Rock Mechanics and Drilling Engineering, from Leeds University, England, Dr Rabia has over 37 years‟ continuous experience in the oil industry. He has served on several committees and conferences worldwide and was secretary and then chairman of the Drilling Engineering Association (Europe). His experience in global oil industry includes Middle East, on its working list being also ADCO (UAE), Aramco (Saudi Arabia) and several other major companies as an in-house senior consultant.