SOLIDS REMOVAL EQUIPMENT EFFICIENCY IN AN UNWEIGHTED DRILLING FLUID

Situation: NoProfit Drilling Company is drilling 100 bbl of hole daily in a formation with 15% porosity. For four consecutive days, 400 bbl of discards and fluid were captured each day in discard tanks. The pit levels remained constant, but some drilling fluid was jetted to the reserve pits daily to keep the pits from overflowing. The unweighted drilling fluid weighed 9.4 ppg daily and contained 2%vol bentonite

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OPTIMUM SOLIDS REMOVAL EQUIPMENT EFFICIENCY

For that reason the resulting solids removal equipment efficiency required is called the optimum solids-removal efficiency. It is independent of the volume of drilled solids reaching the surface, or the volume of the drilling-fluid system. Equating the volume of clean drilling fluid needed to the volume of discard results in the minimum volume of clean drilling fluid needed and, as a consequence, the minimum volume of drilling fluid disposal.

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SOLIDS REMOVAL EQUIPMENT EFFICIENCY FOR MINIMUM VOLUME OF DRILLING FLUID TO DILUTE DRILLED SOLIDS

The minimum volume required to dilute solids remaining after processing by the solids-control equipment depends on the drilled solids concentration in the drilling fluid. If all of the drilled solids are removed from the system, the clean drilling fluid added to return the pit levels back to the original level will dilute the solids already in the drilling fluid. As noted earlier, more clean drilling fluid will be needed to return the pits to the original level with 100% removal than 90% removal of drilled solids.

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