Not all wells are created equal. Sometimes we have a well that is a real barn burner and sometimes we have a dry well. I personally have only ever been on one well that was completely dry meaning no gas, no oil, nothing. This is my first P&A well. P&A stands for Plug and Abandon. It means we are calling it quits before we make it to complication. Once the call has been made (took over 5 days of sitting around doing nothing on this well) the process sounds very simple fill the hole completely with cement and leave.
The actual is a little more complicated. In the end it results in several days of us sitting around doing nothing. After sitting around for four days the plan from on high finally came down. There will be a total of seven different cement pugs in the hole when we are done separated by treated salt water spacers. To pump a cement job like this takes a bunch of trucks and pumps but all off the action happens underground so unfortunately it’s not a very photogenic operation. It is noisy however! We are currently on the second of seven.
Not only is this a P&A of this well but the other wells that where planed have been cancelled as well. The rock just didn’t show enough promise. The formation wasn’t economically viable. There is something down there but it’s just too hard to get at right now with this technology. This is how it goes sometimes. In the future the technology might be better and be able to get more out of this well or formation. It has happened before where the field was considered dead. With new technology like fracking it was able to breathe new life into the field.
As far as the science of this great big science experiment goes we collected lots of great data. From mutable types of cuttings, over 6 boxes of gas samples, to countless logs. All of this date will be scrutinized very closely all winter long and maybe someday we will come back and drill thru the cement and start again.
The worst part of being on a P&A is that the rest of the projects are cancelled too. That means I have no idea where I’m headed next!