Talk:Oil well
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[edit] "Extremely expensive"
The section on cost twice calls construction of oil wells "extremely expensive", but fails to say relative to what. This seems POV. It also claims that "Onshore wells can be considerably cheaper", but gives a wide price range of $1 million - $15 million, which (at current exchange rates) overlaps the range given for offshore wells. Finally, the "extremely expensive" designation seems meant to apply to oil wells as a whole, but the only examples given are offshore wells near Britain. -Dmh
- For example, a mile of new 3-lane motorway costs about £20 Million, comparable to the cost of a new high-pressure, high-temperature North Sea well. Whether the well is expensive depends more on the worth of the oil it produces than the absolute cost. Presumably one does not drill a well with the expectation of losing money. -Dmh 20:53, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
- I've heard that offshore drilling rigs in the Gulf of Mexico (US) currently cost around $300,000 per day to contract, while onshore drilling rigs in East Texas currently cost around $20,000 per day, and these rates are going up from month to month! One engineer for an operator company recently told me that their average cost for drilling and completing an onshore well is around $1.8 million (compared to $800,000 a couple of years ago). --Altailji 07:05, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
With rig rates currently running at 500,000 to 600,000US $ per day for the rig only a spred will cost approx US$ 750,000 plus per day , average length of time for a deep water well is 60 to 70 days = big money no wonder the Drilling companies are doing well NOW but have not always made money like this, Cheers someone on the inside. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 143.97.2.35 (talk) 07:56, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
[edit] "Drill depth"
Discussion of the typical depths reached in the drilling process would be informative. I have not seen anything addressing this aspect of the process. Does the industry have standards for what might be called shallow, normal and deep? -DDD
The maximum drill depth seems to be accurate based on the "The Physics Factbook" (citations should be independently verified), but the deepest seem to be research projects or non-oil wells. The deepest oil well I could find reference to is Z-11 at Sakhalin-I, in the Sea of Okhotsk (Russia), with a depth of "11,282 meters" (37,016 feet). The term used to refer to this type of drilling is "Extended Reach Drilling (ERD)", and after a quick net search, I found the following list of the "Top 20 ERD wells" (again should be independently verified). This list is clearly old as it doesn't include Z-11, and it most likely contains a combined list of oil and non-oil wells. Finally, as mentioned above these deep wells are quite rare and it would be helpful to have an understanding of normal drill depths and costs. dain 18:47, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
- just a note - those wells on the ERD list are not really very deep, in terms of depth below the surface -- the measurements, 11,000 meters etc., are along the drill string, which is at a significant angle to the surface. The next column, TVD, refers to true vertical depth - so those wells on that table are only reaching depths on the order of 1500-2800 m below surface. The deepest oil exploration well, in terms of depth below the surface, is something like 30,000 ft, in Oklahoma USA (don't have the reference at hand, sorry). Cheers Geologyguy 18:56, 7 June 2007 (UTC)From the front page wikepedia "The record-depth Kola Borehole used non-rotary mud motor drilling to achieve a depth of over 12 000 meters (38,000 feet)." Cheers aussie in Stjørdal Norway.12.09.2007
