Welcome to this SPE Live Drilling Automation Lessons
to Learn and Future Interoperability.
My name is John Dewart.
I'm the consultant and president at De wha and Company,
and I will be your moderator today.
Today's SPE Live will last 30 minutes.
We encourage you to ask questions in
the chat during the program.
It is now my pleasure to introduce our guests,
Sarah FEMA Schafer is an experienced engineer
with over a decade of hands-on experience in both offshore
and onshore operations across Europe, working with some
of the biggest names in the oil field services industry.
She currently works as a project manager at banus,
focusing on rolling out digitalization solutions
for drilling and well operations around the globe.
Sarah FEMA serves as the dsat program chair for Europe,
working to create interoperable standards
for drilling automation,
and is an active member of the DWIs Industry Group.
On top of that, she's a proud member of SPE
Sera FEMA has a PhD in Liquifaction
of natural Gas from Bauman State Technical University.
Matt Isbell is a senior drilling engineering advisor
with the Wells team at Hess Corporation.
He is a drilling system subject matter expert
with worldwide experience.
His current focus connects well construction roles
with tools and processes to leverage digital drilling
and engineering to improve outcomes.
He received A-B-B-S-M-E in 1988 from the University
of Texas at Austin.
He serves on the SPE Forum Implementation Committee
and chairs, the IADC Drilling Engineering Committee
and SPE Drilling
and Wells Interoperability Group Advisory Board, Sera Feer.
And Matt, welcome to this SPE Live.
Matt, can you describe the purpose of the Drilling
and Wells interoperability Standards industry group known
as DWIs, its scope of work and governance?
I can, John, thanks for the intro. Uh, hello everybody.
So Dwz is a cross industry group,
and we're working to improve connectivity between, uh,
the key equipment and systems used in well construction
that starts at the well site.
And of course, since it's interoperable is transparent
to any provider, one of our themes is
around enhancing connectivity for systems automation.
So we're trying to, you know, basically connect all
of these systems so that they can communicate
with each other through an interoperable layer.
So to do that, there's four different work streams
that have volunteers, work groups
that do the technical work, things such
as reference architecture, the
automated drilling control systems, software
drilling signal semantics and drilling process protections.
And, you know, finally around the governance that we have a,
an advisory board that's comprised of, uh, operators,
contractors, and service providers.
And we're all busy trying to, uh, herd this body
of work toward active implementation
sometime in the next year or two.
Thank you. Matt Sera, fema, what do you see
as the hurdles drilling systems automation needs to cross
to achieve the next potential level of implementation
and what benefits can accrue?
Thank you, John, and pleasure to be here.
So for any new technology to be implemented
and adopted, it should overcome organizational, technical
and personal human barriers.
And I believe for drilling systems automation,
we have been focusing on the technical challenges,
and there have been great advances in this area.
For example, guidelines
for new interoperable systems are being
developed and demoed.
There have been some successful automated wells drilled.
So I think technically we are getting there,
but organizationally, we're still struggling a lot
in business case for drilling systems.
Automation is still, hasn't proven itself strong enough.
We don't really know how introduced multiple players risk
scores, how, um, how would automatic systems comply
with government regulations?
So I believe all these questions answered would allow us
to advance to the next level of implementation.
And the good news is
that we're not alone with these types of questions.
Other industries are also going
or just went through this phase before.
So therefore we, we invited them also
to speak with us this year.
Thanks, Sarah. Fema, back to you, Matt.
Um, interoperable systems require significant
participation from drilling contractors
and OEMs through their automated drilling control system
and sub-level control systems.
Do you envisage DWIs collaborating more closely
with other industry organizations
who typically represent these two groups?
Well, as you know, any path toward interoperability
requires collaboration.
And that's really one of the key challenges
since there are competitive sensitive sensitivities on the
individual technologies
that run on this interoperable infrastructure, uh,
that's not something that, um, you know,
we've consciously done in the past.
So today many
of the dwz team are on multiple industry efforts,
and we're basically influencing each other through these,
uh, informal ties.
But for interoperability to work in the long term,
there likely needs to be some sort of governance
that is more formal, more representative of the industry,
and we're working on what
that would look like and how it would work.
Thanks, Matt. Sarah, fema back to you.
Who are the speakers for the March Dsat
Art Symposium in Steger,
and what do you expect each to cover in their topics?
Yeah, so our first speaker is Bjorn y,
chief Technology Office for Coburg Maritime.
He would talk about autonomous ships, uh,
remote operations of maritime vessel.
What are the advances in the technology?
Bjorn actually started his career with FFI,
the Norwegian Defense Research establishment on development
of autonomous underwater vehicles.
And later he joined Kongsberg Maritime
where he held different leadership positions.
The second speaker would be Doug Moland.
He's a senior it o OT advisor
and maintenance lead Fortina,
which is the largest di diary product company in Norway
since the design of, uh, TNA factory in year.
And Doug has been involved in standardizing assets
and data to improve consistency and efficiency.
And in recent years, he has turned his attention
to utilizing data through AI analytics
and manufacturing execution systems, aiming
to enhance the process in di production
by blending modern technology with established practices.
So he would talk on utilizing data through AI analytics
and how to enhance processes, um, in his, uh,
production where he's working.
Our third speaker is Dr. Costas Alexis.
He's professor at Norwegian University
of Technology and Science.
He conducts research in the domain of, uh, resilient,
uh, robotic autonomy.
Through his studies, he has examined the potential
of autonomous systems to navigate extreme environments,
and his research areas include the domains of robot control,
path planning and simultaneous localization and mapping.
He's been part of the res team
for the DARPA Subterranean Challenge, and we talk about that
and, uh, resilient robot autonomy.
So I believe we have quite exciting speakers line up
for the Dsat S Arts Symposium,
and we're looking forward to their presentation.
Thanks, Sarah. Yes, it sounds like an exciting lineup
and plenty of lessons to learn from other industries.
So, Matt, back to you.
Generally, what has dwst accomplished so far,
and is this information public?
And where can viewers learn more?
Thanks, John. So pretty much everything that we've done is
publicly available, uh, through our website,
through technical papers and, and articles.
Uh, this includes, uh, a lot of codes,
supporting documentation and all different kinds of content.
Uh, as, as far as what we've accomplished, uh,
we've developed a system architecture
for an interoperable layer
and are steadily working toward, uh, products that, uh,
interface between the, the, the industry rig controls
and these, uh, advisory systems.
So we plan on doing a series
of public demonstrations throughout 2025
as this work permits.
And the first one is a schedule for this Friday.
Uh, you can go to our, our website at uh, dwis.org
and, uh, get more information about it
and as, as well as an upcoming event
that we'll talk more about here in a, in a few minutes.
Thanks, Matt. Sarah, fema, you described three industries
that have no direct connection with the drilling industry
who are presenting at the symposium.
What do you expect participants
to learn from these three industries?
We, well, we have invited representatives from three
different industries, which can share their knowledge on
automation from different angles.
The oil and gas industry,
particularly the well construction process is characterized
by high risk, often hazardous operations
that require real time complex decision making based on best
available practices, HEC, um, and other practices.
So HEC is also the highest priority in such operations,
autonomous maritime operations,
and especially autonomous ships, uh, bring lots
of similarities with oil and gas industry.
Here we can discuss safety in unpredictable irregular
situations, reliability of the automation system.
In case of sensor failures.
We would also be interesting
to hear about legal limitations, liabilities
and government regulations that were encountered
with introduction of autonomous systems
and how they were overcome.
Um, experience for automated, uh,
diary factory in Yen brings another side of the discussion.
First. Every once in a while,
drilling automation is compared with a production process.
We don't necessarily compare ourselves
with direct production,
but there is a great opportunity
to learn about an automated process
and how things are done there.
And I'm sure our participants would be impressed
by the level of automation such factories can achieve.
Second, we would look at how data is efficiently utilized
through AI analytics
and manufacturing execution system,
how new technology is leveraged in the existing systems.
And I'm sure here we can all see ourselves learning on
how we ensure that safety while running new solutions,
talking about data acquisition
and processing cybersecurity measures and so on.
With resilient robot autonomy,
the participants would dive into the world of robots built
by a leading university, more academic approach.
And I mean, who wouldn't be excited
to hear about the subterranean challenge
and competition where teams of flying robots
or drones had to, uh,
to be collect an object in challenging underground
environments such as caves?
Imagine the complexity of automation in such system
of systems where it is not only one robot,
but a whole set of them must communicate and cooperate.
So there is definitely a lot of inspirations
and learnings to gain.
Thanks. Se bera I'll, I'll stick
with you for the next question.
Will participants to the symposium be able to converse
with the speakers in an formal
and informal format to learn more from their,
for their own takeaways?
And also if people cannot attend, is there a means for them
to join virtually?
Yeah, we have prepared different opportunities
for the participants to converse with the speakers.
Overall format would include a 30 40 minute presentation
where each speaker can share their knowledge, learnings,
and best practices,
which they see valuable across the industries.
And then the presentation would be followed by a 20,
30 minute q
and a session to provide an interesting
discussion for the audience.
There is also would be a coffee break
and the network reception
after the presentations to converse
with the speakers in a more informal format.
But as some of the people won't be able to attend,
we have also organized the live streaming of the event
that will be possible to see online.
And the video recording
of the symposium would also be available after?
Yeah, I think at the live streaming event will be through
the SPED SATs YouTube channel.
So if people want to follow that,
it'll be on the Norwegian time zone
and it will be available directly to viewer
as a recording later.
And Matt, I understand the March 7th session you've referred
to, we'll have a half day process
to develop a roadmap into the future for the DWS endeavor.
Can you describe the plan process and your expectations?
Yeah, sure. Uh, we're at an interesting stage in, uh, dws.
Much of the foundation technology is available
and now we have to figure out how to get it up,
uh, to implementation.
So doing that means the stakeholders that, uh,
will adopt these technologies and try 'em out
and help us get 'em across the finish line.
So that's a pretty big ask, right?
Wanting somebody to try out your new
interoperable, uh, layer.
And it requires change management and, uh, investment
and a bunch of additional collaboration.
So this roadmap process is intended to map out
how we will engage systematically
to bring about this, this outcome.
So we have a process that starts
with some reflection on a current state,
and then we, you know, talk about our vi our vision,
which you can think of as a desired future state,
and then uses different perspectives, so service provider,
operator, contractor to consider ideas about
how to address the gaps.
It's a very engaging way to imagine the future,
and it should be a lot of fun for the, uh, participants
and attendees at our March 7th event.
Yeah, thanks Matt. And,
and sticking with you some more on DWIs.
So DWI started as a subcommittee of dsat s then it migrated
to OSDU and later returned to DS a's umbrella.
It seems to offer free products to anyone in the industry.
Do you envisage it remaining part of dsat s
and will its future work require funding?
This is one of the reasons that we wanted
to have the roadmap discussion, right?
If, if we were to become a standards
or other content producing body, then, you know, we have
to figure out how that would work within SPE,
within the drilling systems automation,
technical SEC section
and the, the legacy work that we've done as DW right?
Plus there's other industry bodies like OSDU
and the IADC, advanced Rig Technology committee
that also have a stake in, uh, what we're developing.
So we're, we're busy trying to figure out, uh, you know,
kind of game our way through a couple of different scenarios
to figure out what that would look like.
There's, there's other examples out there, you know, like,
uh, which is the industry steering co, uh, committee on,
well, collision avoidance that, uh, has, has some, uh, ideas
and a model that, uh, we may consider for the future.
Um, OSDU is a very strong, uh, case too, right?
In terms of having a, a body that could,
uh, do this kind of work.
So we're, we're trying to figure it out.
So if people want to be on board with where it's going,
they should come to your Friday, march the seventh session
and participate, I guess.
Definitely. And if you, if you want to accelerate this,
uh, you know, consider getting involved in our committee,
we have a whole bunch of different ways to participate,
whether you're doing the technical work
or whether you're imagining the framework that we'll use to,
uh, implement this.
We, we have a, a lot of work to be done and, uh, a very fun
and exciting committee to, uh, work with to do that.
Okay. I'll, I'll throw a, a question to both of you
and probably start with matters as you were the last one up.
If we look at the industry today,
we read a lot about capital discipline,
and we also see major operators struggling
and wanting to change their direction
and also some significant layoffs going on.
And with this, you start to look at cost impact
on technology implementation.
What, what's your view on cost impact for the growth
of drilling systems automation going forwards?
Yeah, so I like to think of this as kind
of your classic breakeven curve.
Um, right? So you can think of the number of wells, uh, as,
as one axis and the, the value that, uh, is required
to produce those wells on the other axis, right?
And somewhere there's a break even in terms
of the investment that we must make as an industry
before we start to realize the benefit.
And I, I think that's one of the reasons that we struggle
with the value case is, you know, individual technologies
can't do that on their own.
It is the accumulation
and interaction of all of these different technologies
that ultimately causes that breakeven point to, to pass.
So all of the value is, is out in front of us, right?
Uh, it's, it's not
that the systems don't offer immediate value, it's just
that, you know, value with the capital V is, uh,
is still a ways out.
Yeah. Sera, fema, can you share your thoughts on that?
Yeah, I think implementation is quite an important, um,
question in terms for, for, for the automation.
And, and then I believe also, uh, there's, uh, what,
what Ma Matt was saying, uh, towards the, uh, the, the,
the business case, it's for automation,
it's a little bit hard to, to share, right?
The results, right? Um, yeah, right,
right away possible to, to work on.
And, um, I believe also
that right now there's some new technologies coming in place
that, um, sometimes can maybe disturb the, uh,
the implementation for,
or like the role that has been taken
towards drilling automation.
Um, and I think this is not necessarily always the right way
to, to go because, um, I think as, as the course is taken,
uh, we should, um, yeah, all,
all the parties should align towards, um,
achieving the goal.
But, um, uh, back to what is Matt is saying, that's, uh, uh,
all the parties should win in this, um, uh, in this process.
So I think what we are trying to do now is, is to put more,
maybe focus on, on implementation
or, um, understand maybe how all the parties could be part
of it, uh, so that everybody well as as win-win, right?
Or achieves their, their goals, um, going forward.
So thi this is the balance
that we're looking into right now.
Okay. Sticking with you, seraphim.
We have a question here from the audience from Robert Estes,
Fred Dupre and Sam Noyer, both from Texas a
and m showed at Forge, which is the, uh,
the geothermal project up in Utah.
They showed how experimentation
with drilling parameters is required to optimize ROP
for each BHA.
And if you don't know it, they went from,
if I recall correctly, 15 feet an hour to over a hundred,
and even seeing 200 feet an hour
with longer bit run intervals.
So they really accomplished a lot in hard rock formation.
So the question Robert has is how can automation help
with this stepwise process?
Um, yeah, I believe, um, um,
let me just read the question one more time.
Um, yeah, the, um,
maybe Matt can go first, like,
I need a moment, I think, to read it.
Sure thing. So one of the things
that I've learned about automation is
that it's really just a way to implement proven practices.
Uh, so if you look at the improvements
that automation has brought,
it's not the automation that did that.
It is figuring out the drilling process
and coming up with a controllable, repeatable way
to improve the physics that are happening down hole, right?
I recently analyzed a, a, a four mile lateral,
and, uh, they didn't use automation at all,
but they did use all of the different practices
that the automation had.
So in terms of, you know, how they ramped up
and went to bottom and how they, you know,
released the e energy at the end,
and I mean, all of those things
that were in our automated systems were honored
by the drillers, although they chose to do it manually.
So really what it is, is figuring out, uh,
what's happening down hole and,
and how to, how to improve the physics, either
of the drilling system itself, the operating parameters
or the environmental conditions.
So the work that we've done to analyze
and improve those processes,
which we have then transferred into the drilling, uh,
automation processes, uh, it's, it's the improvement work
that, that actually unlocks it, right?
The automation is just makes it easier to implement.
Okay. Um, I think, yeah, I would also to add up
to this is, um, I think automation can
actually just facilitate this process
because if you look at the drilling automation,
it could be seen right as a, well as a a close cycle.
Yeah, a close loop, uh, that allows you to,
to experiment you,
you can adjust certain drilling parameters
and then, uh, based on that,
get some response from the sensors.
And then based on this response of the sensors, uh, uh,
optimize and provide maybe new parameters to, to apply to,
and this is all can happen, um, quite short period.
Yeah. At the, at the end of the beat almost at this moment.
So I think, uh, this, uh, closing of the,
the automation allows to this closing of the look to be
yeah, go much faster and, um, only accelerates the process.
So,
So our next question comes from Paul past sec
and Paul asked, do either
of you have thoughts on using one automation system
where lessons learned can be quickly spread to other rigs
versus multiple systems
that may have different implementation ideas
that are better than just one?
I have a lot of thoughts on that one.
Yeah, go for it, Matt.
Oh, I mean, we've been working on systems that, you know,
have basically the overall structured plan for well delivery
and, you know, the, it's the activities within
that overall plan that contain the, uh, use
of those automated systems.
So the lessons learned piece is, is really at that, um,
uh, well delivery level
and, uh, you know, being able to spread that rapidly
between the different rigs.
Uh, if you think about, uh, that's, that's,
that's really the goal of, of using these systems, right?
Is, is how do you improve it?
And whether you're learning it from the automation piece
or whether you're learning it from the process understanding
and improvement piece, it, it, it really is the same thing.
Um, so, you know, I, I think,
I think these things are self-reinforcing
if you use them correctly.
You know, if you think about the, uh,
way humans make decisions, right?
We acquire informations, we analyze it, uh, we, uh,
select an action and then we implement.
And really, if you're doing your automated system correctly,
the human is outside of that loop instead of in
between those different steps.
The way we're using automation today, we're still inside
of that loop, right?
So I think the, the question that Paul is proposing is,
you know, how do we move ourselves outside of that loop so
that these systems work and improve,
and we cascade that rapidly to other Briggs
and o other operations.
Yeah. To add up to that, um, I think it's, uh, it's,
it's a very good question also.
It's, uh, in terms of, uh,
how do we apply drilling automation, um, on, on, you know,
on, on various rigs?
And, and from what I can see, you know, coming from Norway,
the drilling automation we're talking,
sometimes this could be such a different, uh, thing meaning
for, for, for various areas, right?
So, uh, uh, one thing that works, uh, quite,
quite good in the, in the US land is completely different in
the offshore Norway just because of the number of factors
or a variety of factors that address it.
So how to make a system that can actually, uh,
be applicable across the globe.
Uh, and that's also, again, ties into the implementation
because we're all a different level of technology at this,
at this time, different level of digitalization.
Uh, so, um, I think this is where the, the challenge is.
And, and that partially also what this, what we are trying
to do in D is, is to, uh, maybe
to remove these differences, right?
Or make it that possible for, for people maybe, uh,
in various locations to, to tap into the,
the knowledge available and,
and use the system, um, uh, interoperable system
and to, to act on it in, in whatever, uh,
set up they have where they're now.
Okay. Thank you. So we have another question
from the audience here.
This is from Abdul Satar Raja.
What case studies exemplify successful drilling automation
implementations and their impact on performance?
I'll jump in on that one.
Uh, if you look at my name on one Petro,
you'll find several, uh, different implementation examples
as well as, uh, the process improvement work that we did
to identify and address the limiters.
Uh, as, as part of it, uh, there are other fleet wide, uh,
uh, discussions that are going on.
And, you know, if you look at just about all of the, uh,
drilling contractor, uh, papers over the last couple
of years, they all have examples of, uh, different systems
that they've implemented
and begun to integrate into the, you know, the well,
well delivery, well construction process.
So there's, there's many, many different case studies
that are being published, uh, on paper now,
and, you know, that's really evidence
that we're picking up the pace of, uh,
either using the systems
or you can also argue that we're, we're analyzing
performance, so that performance in a manner
that can be automated more and more.
I think the best case is for, for drilling automation, uh,
uh, I, I would say it's, uh, it is best to ask, ask the,
the operator companies.
But I think the overall, the successful drilling automation
to me means, uh, also, um, uh, a case with,
with multiple actors, right?
And we see more and more of those coming along.
So, uh, it's service companies,
it could be software companies.
So I think, uh, these, these cases we will,
when such collaborations, uh, they become more
and more, uh, popular or yeah, more visible in our industry.
And I think that's, that's a road to go
and that's where we, we would like to be.
Okay. We've got another question,
and I think it's probably going
to be our last question from the audience.
This one comes from Blakely Farrow,
who people would probably like
to know will become the next chair of Dsat s as
of our March meeting on the third in Steger.
She says, it seems the next step change is marrying the
detailed engineering models with automated drilling systems.
How can we accomplish
that without overwhelming operations team?
Go for it, Matt.
Alright. Uh, I have a lot of opinions about this one.
You know, I think the way to do that is that, uh,
if you develop it behind the scenes
and you only expose the operations teams
to the visualizations
and the, the automated systems, um, you know, we don't need
to drag them through all of the different, uh,
analytics and other things.
You know, they don't need to become experts on
the systems to use them.
The main thing they need is the, to be able
to trust them right back
to your washing machine as a model, right?
You probably don't study it to figure out how it works
and you're probably not staring at it to make sure
that it works correctly, right?
I mean, so if, if we can do the work, provide the,
the proven systems to the operations teams,
then I think they just adopt, uh, the methodology that comes
with them and, and they don't really
worry about the details.
Uh, you know, they may want to be educated on how they work,
but, uh, in terms of, you know, having to understand all
of the technologies in play, I, I don't see that as,
as an important,
Yeah, I would like also to say from,
from my experience in the, with implementation
of new technologies, um, I think this, well, this, this,
this marriage is already happening and,
and there will be, uh, you know, more different, uh,
systems tie in into the DR together
with the automated drilling systems.
Uh, but I think the, it is only a, yeah, a limited amount
of information that would pres presented to the,
to the drilling team.
But what is important to understand that there also has
to be a way to, to provide trust for the, for any
of the technology that is,
that is running at this given time, right?
So there has to be, if required some visibility
to the RIG team to go and sense and field,
because we're all humans
and we really, uh, not really
to give up our authority right away, so, so fast.
So I think the, the technologies
that will come in the next five, 10 years at least,
they would be a kind of a combination
where you could still verify certain numbers if you really
need it, but that at the same time, uh, you more
and more rely on the technology,
but further going along, I, uh, yeah, ISAL, you probably,
uh, would just follow with what it's recommended.
Yeah. Thank you for those responses.
I, I think the word that comes up is trust and,
and how the people in the field can get to the point
of trusting the system,
but I'm not gonna go into that now, so thank you Sarah.
FEMA and Matt, your responses were very enlightening.
They opened the door to further dialogue
with our three speakers at the SPE dsat,
IADC Art Symposium March the third, 2025,
as well as participant input to the trajectory
of DWIs on Friday, March the seventh.
Both of these sessions will be going on in sga.
Registration for the symposium is now open on the
SPE Drilling conference.
Website seating is limited, so I encourage you
and your colleagues to register soon.
Also, registration
to attend the DWIs Industry Engagement workshop is available
on the SPE Dsat S website,
the Dsat S Arts Symposium on March the third will also be
livestreamed on the SPE DSAT YouTube channel.
Thank you for the questions and comments
and for joining us today.
See you next time.
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