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Well Integrity Test Has Now Started, But Oil Industry Experts Ask "What the Hell Are They Doing?"
Admiral Thad Allen just
announced that the well integrity test has gotten a green light.
For background on what this means, see this
and this.
The test has already started. You can watch live here.
As I noted yesterday, BP suspended the "top kill" operation for 16 hours - because, according to
numerous experts, it was creating more
damage to the well bore - without
even telling the media, local officials or the public that it
had even delayed the effort until long afterwards.
Similarly, it
took more than 5
hours for BP to publicly announce the delay of the well integrity
test after the decision to delay was made.
More importantly, oil
industry expert Rob Cavner - who has been right about virtually
everything so far, previously explaining
that there is damage in the oil well beneath the seafloor, and that BP
has to let the oil spill keep on gushing to avoid further damage to
the well bore until the well can be killed with relief wells
(subsequently confirmed
by BP) - now says that he is worried that the well integrity
test could further damage the well bore and could blow out the entire
well:ndustry expert
Rob Cavner - who has been right about virtually everything so far,
previously explaining
that there is damage in the oil well beneath the seafloor, and that BP
has to let the oil spill keep on gushing to avoid further damage to
the well bore until the well can be killed with relief wells
(subsequently confirmed
by BP) - now says that he is worried that the well integrity
test could further damage the well bore and could blow out the entire
well:
Recently-retired Shell Oil President John Hofmeister made a similar
point today:
I think the fundamental issue… is
there are serious concerns about the integrity of the casing that is
the well itself.
And that by putting the cap on and doing the
stress tests… that the integrity of the steel is insufficient to hold
the pressure of the well.
And if you lose the casing its game
over.
It’s like having a volcano on the bottom of the sea.
If
you lose the casing and oil starts coming up on the outside of the
casing you cant stop it.
There’s nothing you can do that would
stop it…other than implode the well.
There are many in the
industry that feel the casing must have been damaged because of the
power of that well, the pressure of that reservoir.
Hofmeister
stresses:
Let's not do the "stress tests" until we're
ready to go with the relief wells... Better have relief wells up and
operating before [you run any integrity tests].
And as Cavner points
out today, the government and BP are fooling around instead of killing off
this monster once and for all with the relief wells:
What?
Well integrity test? I've looked back through all of my notes,
blog entries, and reviewed BP's and the Unified Command's
communications. I've even done multiple internet searches, and found
the first mention of a "well integrity test" related to BP on this past
Sunday, July 11. Certainly I could have missed something, but I don't
recall even a single mention of what I consider to be probably the most
significant (and risky) operation BP has conducted since the much
hailed, and utterly failed, top kill procedure that kept the masses
enthralled during the Memorial Day weekend.
***
This
morning, we learned that, even thought the stack has now been set for 3
days, they actually haven't hooked up the two new valves. He also
announced that yesterday, they pulled all of the ships off site to run a
seismic survey, and, alarmingly, have stopped drilling the relief
well, which is now only 4 feet away laterally from the blowout well.
Since Dudley's letter to Adm. Allen last Friday laying out the relief
well timeline, they have made little progress and have only 34 more feet
to drill before they get to casing point for the last string of pipe. 34
feet, and they stopped. They're just sitting there circulating on
bottom at 17,840. Just sitting there. Wells claims that they are
doing that for "safety reasons" during the well integrity test. The
one they're not going to run for at least another 24 hours. What?I'm
sorry, but I have to ask, What the hell are they doing? We now
have an ability to capture all the oil and stop this massive pollution
of the Gulf (as well as measure it). We have great weather to get the
relief well completed. We already know, without the "well integrity
test", that they have severe damage to the BOP and other surface
equipment and casing. If that weren't true, the damn thing wouldn't
have blown out in the first place. We also know that between the
"capping stack" and the old BOP that there is a non-wellhead rated piece
of equipment, known
as the flex joint, along with the riser adapter,
that we've talked about before. This piece of equipment, that normally
sits above the BOP, is not rated to nearly those pressures
encountered by wellhead equipment. All of the other components in this
BOP are rated to at least 10,000 psi (new, off the shelf, and
undamaged); this piece is by far the weakest link in the chain,
especially since it took severe stresses as the rig sank and 5,000 feet
of riser torqued it as it sank. Yesterday, Adm. Allen announced they
were going to take the stack, including this flex joint, to as high as
9,000 psi for up to 48 hours. I have been unable to learn the model and
rating of the flex joint here, but Oil States advertises their LMRP
flex joints to be rated 600-6,000 psi, far below the 9,000 to which Adm
Allen said they would potentially go; even with the 2,200 psi of
hydrostatic pressure on the outside of the competent caused by it being
in 5,000 feet of water, it's still at least 1,000 psi differential
pressure over the rating of the component.Surely, I'm missing
something here, but all of this seems like reckless rope-a-dope in the
tradition of Muhammad Ali in his best rope-a-doping days. Either that,
or there are so many cooks in the kitchen that the pot is boiling over
while the chefs all stand around arguing about spices. Boxing and
cooking analogies aside, I don't think anyone is actually in charge, and
if anyone is, they are certainly not interested in giving any real
information.
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See that's what you get listening to Olberman. The relief well will KILL the blowout by pumping mud & then cement. It will not flow oil and not let the world know squat. Even if it did it would not provide information about the rate of flow from the other borehole. So, as usual, Olberman is providing utter nonsense from lefty loon land.
Thank you for the ongoing updates on this most critical issue. Anyone digging deeper into this will find people are already dying from the air and plants as far away as 200 miles are affected by the rain /poison mix. Its poison clear and simple, since it kills plants and animals.
The entire state of Florida will be uninhabitable by the end of this year. rain will carry this poison for many years. I live on the west coast and am preparing to grow my own food under glass. Our ability to breathe oxygen is something we all have taken for granted.
There are some business oportunities implied here. Like 5.00 to spend an hour in my green house breathing clean air!
No fiat accepted!
I know that my fig trees are not filled with figs this year. does a high benzene concentration in the air affect those plants. I'm only 500 miles north of this disaster and boarding up the house now. Do you think BP should pay for us moving to Canada? Any suggestions on where the fish are biting now up there?
walleye about 70-80 ft deep now, don't forget your downriggers.
ahhhhhhh.........................run for your lives!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Idiocracy. Suttles is probably telling Thad Allen that they are trying to locate the "Time Masheen" so that they can undo the mess.
Nuke, baby, nuke.
Maybe they could put toilet water on it.
Now I know why they were scraping the $OIS name from the FlexJoint which look suspect at the time - http://bit.ly/9Jfi7L http://bit.ly/b69q5j
Holy coverup, Batman -- could it be BP is not telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth? I suppose it's not perjury until you're under oath...
Seriously though, good find. Does this level of hubris not shock anyone? They know they are on live webcast 24/7, but will continue shredding documentation anyway?
OK seriously, this is more freakout ridiculous propaganda by so-called "industry experts".
Why did BP wait 5 hours to tell us something? Are you serious? Have you ever been on a rig? Jesus... You make decisions, see how things go and decide what to do from there. Things don't happen instantly.
And why did they stop drilling before setting casing?? Why did they stop while doing a well integrity test on another well that's only 4 feet away?? Geee I dunno - Is this a SUPER IMPORTANT HPHT WELL? Oh it is? Maybe they are cirulating the hole clean and doing an extra thurough job of conditioning the mud SO THE CASING AND CEMENT JOB DOESNT FAIL LIKE ON THE LAST WELL! Ya think? F...
You can't run high pressures in an adjacent well and expect no communication between wells. Of course they are going to stop drilling and circulate while conducting the integrity test on the adjacent well. Thats SAFETY.
Some of this crap is just retarded. Sorry it has to be said.
What is retarded is that you took the time to write all that but didn't have enough time to actually visit the 2 links that we are referring to. How and why did BP have time during all this to sand painted words or numbers off the side of that equipment?
Well theres 11 links in this post. Am I supposed to click on all of them to find some obscure reference to what you are talking about?
How about I just read whats in the post and reply to that. This is all sensational crap. Anyone who works in drilling can tell you that right away.
LOL!!!
I hadn't seen that before, Thanx!
Gone are the days when we could ask WTF and get an actual answer.