NADET Institute Sponsors Industry Workshop Series

• Advanced Mining Technology Workshop
• Advanced Geothermal Drilling Workshop
• Advanced Tunneling Workshop
• Advanced Sensing Workshop
• Advanced Oil and Gas Drilling Workshop

Wherever possible, workshops have been scheduled in conjunction with industry-related conferences and meetings in order to encourage participation by members of the targeted industry.

The workshop series has been quite successful. Attendees have overwhelmingly supported the NADET concept and have provided the NADET Institute with valuable information about the technological needs of their industries and the role they believe NADET can play in filling those needs. Brief summaries of each workshop follow:

Advanced Mining Technology Workshop

Attendees agreed that it is clear that improved drilling and excavation technologies are needed by the mining industry. What is not clear is how these technologies will be developed in the absence of a coordinated support effort such as that from the former U.S. Bureau of Mines. The NADET program is intended to create cooperative efforts that can develop the necessary major advances. But "partnering" has been difficult in the development of new methods (in situ mining was of particular interest) because of the belief that "all deposits are different," and the selection of one deposit for demonstration would be of no use to other partners. Indeed, mining industry interests have traditionally focused on the deposit rather than the extraction technology. When an operation was not economic, the search has been for a better deposit rather than a better technology. But times are changing (and better deposits are harder to find). There is now an increasing interest in better technology and in the cooperative programs that will be necessary to develop them. In listing the "barriers" to new mining technology, attendees made a striking revelation: with the possible exception of system complexity, the list contained not a single technical barrier. The issues cited were, given proper leadership, clearly better resolved by cooperative action (and lack of leadership was one of the barriers). Jon Ahlness best summarized the findings of the workshop: "Development of new, lower cost, environmentally friendly mining methods must continue."

Advanced Geothermal Drilling Workshop

Because the NADET Institute has been funded solely by DOE Geothermal funds, considerable time was spent in discussing with the industry group the cooperative, inter-industry NADET format and that expected funding from other industries in the future would be of direct benefit to advances in geothermal drilling technologies.

The technical program opened with a review of advanced drilling systems prospects from a study underway at Sandia National Laboratory. Proponents of several advanced components presented summaries of their work and Marc Steffen of Calpine offered a "View from the Field." Following these presentations the workshop moved into a general discussion of geothermal drilling issues and opportunities.

Three recommendations were made concerning the then-pending NADET RFP:

1. each proposal should state how the product fits within the total drilling system in a plausible way,
2. each proposal should have some industry participation, and
3. an advisory committee from industry should review proposals.

As discussed elsewhere in the NADET News, an industry advisory board has been formed, and it was instrumental in defining the solicitation for proposals which led to the present NADET-funded research program.

Advanced Tunneling Workshop

If budgets were no constraint and if testing facilities were readily availabl e, what should the tunneling industry be doing in terms of R&D (full range, from research through system demonstration)? What can the industry do now with NADET that it couldn't do before?

With this charge to the attendees, and with an opening suggestion from Dick Robbins that attendees suspend proprietary issues in favor of open, system-wide, innovative thinking, the workshop was off to a free-wheeling discussion of major issues and long-range goals. A truly continuous, integrated, boring-lining concept, a "universal tunneling system," was offered as a vehicle for advanced system discussion. While it served admirably in that role, and a call was made for its development, the "universal" title was ultimately rejected because earlier work under that title had failed.

Four industry leaders were invited to present opening remarks: Dick Robbins, Harvey Parker, Ray Sterling, and Ed Cording. Ray Sterling, Chairman of the Trenchless Technology Center, reflected the full range of NADET "tunneling" interest, from very small to large.

Important tunneling issues were reviewed without much surprise: component costs and reliability, and the desire for higher advance rates in hard rock; the desire for steady, reliable (though not necessarily high speed) advance in bad ground; the undersea problems of low internal friction and water-induced ground failures; and the need to explore well ahead of the bore to determine and prepare for conditions to be encountered. As might be expected, these issues were repeatedly addressed in the subsequent discussions. With regard to the exploration issue, it was suggested that it may even become policy in the future to require drilling ahead along the entire path of the excavation to determine ground conditions and to identify problem zones (a clear area for the inter-industry smart drilling research aims of the NADET program).

A number of advanced, semi-continuous tunneling/lining systems developed in Germany, Argentina, and Japan were reviewed. It was concluded that the United States is "behind the power curve" in many of these areas, particularly in the soft-ground shield systems. It was suggested that the United States should pick a truly continuous system and carry out its development and use. Earlier and significant federal support for "rapid excavation," motivated by cold war underground defense facilities, was cited as a model. Perhaps in contrast to that rather narrow interest, it was noted that the suggested effort would be widely beneficial in applications ranging from economical tunneling/lining in widely varying ground conditions to rapid mine rescue operations. An effective program must be developed and then sustained through commercial application.

It was suggested that in addition to seeking improved continuous tunneling/lining systems for bad ground operations, we should also seek means to improve the ground itself - that is through grouting or freezing. It was noted that better grouting materials have been and are being developed, and this is a promising area for R&D.

The importance of ground control was repeatedly stressed. Delays and unanticipated costs are far more often attributed to ground support and control than to excavation, per se. Difficulties range from support in very soft ground, where "excavation" consists only of properly controlling the unaided inflow of material, to mixed-face tunneling where excavation is extremely difficult and immediate ground support is equally difficult and essential. Advanced soft ground systems are quite well developed, but the mixed ground problems remain. The "universal" system does not exist. It was accepted as a worthy goal, but "far off." In all cases, the need for an integration of excavation and ground support requirements and of the associated machine components was stressed.

Lunch was accompanied by an address by Ezra Ehrenkrantz, and architect and urban planner, and Tom Iseley, a trenchless technology proponent, on "Valuing Underground Space." They presented urban system planning options that would benefit from and motivate substantial advances in tunneling technology.

Overall the workshop remained directed to the large issues of tunneling opportunities and technology goals, and remarkably free of prolonged discussion of technical details. Program strategies emerged that are entirely consistent with NADET aims, like tying broad societal benefits to technological opportunities to justify a substantial program, and exploiting the full range of relevant, multi-industry activities. For example, it was suggested that we use economical, small-scale "trenchless" projects as stepping stones to later, large-scale advanced tunneling programs.

Advanced Sensing Workshop

Carl Peterson opened the workshop with an overview of the NADET program and then went on to cite the National Research Council's study that recommended pursuit of "smart" drilling systems that will need a wide variety of sensing systems. He pointed out that all advanced drilling systems will need sophisticated sensing technologies to see ahead of the bit or to evaluate downhole conditions.

Participants were asked: Who's doing research? Where should NADET look for sensing ideas? Their response was that the real need and real market is in infrastructure-related work in the shallow subsurface. This work ranges from being able to see other constructed works ahead of new tunneling to being able to accurately chase and map the edge of a pollution plume.

Advanced Oil and Gas Drilling Workshop

Inasmuch as there are already mechanisms for cooperative R&D in the oil and gas industry (and a trend toward increased cooperation is evident) the purpose of this workshop was to explore the question, "What can be done for advancing drilling now with the assistance of NADET that has not been possible in NADET's absence?" The workshop seemed to progress in two different, and equally useful, directions: a discussion of the technological needs, opportunities, and activities; and a discussion of the state of research in the industry - its decline, the growing trend toward cooperative programs, and the status of existing cooperative programs.

It became evident early that faster drilling, or even lower cost drilling, is not an end unto itself. In many cases, higher productivity wells are the goal, even if drilling costs increase, because total drilling costs for a resource can be decreased if fewer wells are necessary. As one producer put it, the secret to success lies in owning a good formation, not good technology. The message conveyed is not that better drilling technology is not needed, but, rather, that drilling technology should not be treated as a separate issue.

Al Yost of the DOE Morgantown Energy Technology Center summarized that group's extensive drilling research program (See "Drilling RD&D..." P.__). He characterized drilling research programs on a chart, plotting R&D effort vertically against economic impact horizontally. The DOE program is aimed generally at the upper right corner - high effort and high impact. It was suggested that the lower right corner - high impact with low effort - may be of greater interest, but that area should be adequately exploited by the private sector.

Richard Parker of the Gas Research Institute discussed that organization's drilling research program, a program that will also be summarized in a future NADET News.

The increasing interest in collaborative programs is evident in the current MObil/BP/TExaco/CHevron (MOBPTECH) program. As had been previously presented at the ASME Energy Week, this collaboration is motivated by three factors:

1. The need for better technology in the face of increasing competition.
2. The need to look outside the oil and gas industry for technology and talent.
3. The need to consider advances in support of the oil and gas industry as a whole rather than for individual proprietary advantage.

(These coincide with the motivations for an inter-industry NADET format.)

This program is explicitly interested in longer-range projects as well as the more common short-range industrially-sponsored work. One early project seeks to accelerate the learning process that often leads to substantial drilling cost reductions as more wells are drilled in a new field. Acceleration may require refined drilling simulation programs and even increased drilling costs in order to explore experimental variation of drilling parameters during drilling of the first well (or early wells).

Numerous R&D programs were described by a number of participants, including mud motors, TSC bits and bit materials, underbalanced drilling (the production of an underbalanced drilling manual sponsored by GRI, expected in February, 1997), carbon-fiber cement reinforcement, disc cutter bits, guided drilling and so on. On one list of RD&D technology areas, most were intended to improve well productivity, as might be expected. The one area not being pursued was "unconventional drilling." Yet there is increasing interest in unconventional drilling and in the renewed search for drilling breakthroughs.

One speaker suggested that bit hydraulics is the best opportunity for improving penetration rate. Options for significant improvement include multi-conduit fluid systems. Indeed, others have said that the substantial gains observed from properly coordinated (i.e., closely spaced) mechanical cutters and moderate pressure water jets have not been exploited in practical bit designs. It was recommended that NADET undertake a thorough study of the effect of hydraulic power on drilling (but clearly the performance is also very sensitive to the hole bottom distribution of that power.)

The oil and gas drilling industry has long enjoyed mechanisms for collaborative research on technologies of common interest, particularly in comparison to the other drilling and excavation-dependent industries. DEA, the Drilling Engineering Association, has sustained an outstanding cooperative program, but some suggest that interest and support for this program has declined. In view of the renewed interest in collaborative programs, including long-range programs, perhaps a review of the industry's existing collaborative mechanisms is in order. This is certainly true from the NADET Institute viewpoint in order that we find a role that enhances the overall effort, rather than one that duplicates or competes with existing mechanisms. In any case, it is clear from this workshop that there are numerous needs and opportunities, and that a collaborative approach is the best approach, and that there is plenty of work to go around.

Complete Minutes