Technology Development and Field Trials of EGS Drilling Systems at Chocolate Mountain

Description

Polycrystalline diamond compact (PDC) bits are routinely used in the oil and gas industry for drilling medium to hard rock but have not been adopted for geothermal drilling, largely due to past reliability issues and higher purchase costs. The Sandia Geothermal Research Department has recently completed a field demonstration of the applicability of advanced synthetic diamond drill bits for production geothermal drilling. Two commercially-available PDC bits were tested in a geothermal drilling program in the Chocolate Mountains in Southern California. These bits drilled the granitic formations with significantly better Rate of Penetration (ROP) and bit life than the roller cone bit they are compared with. Drilling records and bit performance data along with associated drilling cost savings are presented herein. The drilling trials have demonstrated PDC bit drilling technology has matured for applicability and improvements to geothermal drilling. This will be especially beneficial for development of Enhanced Geothermal Systems whereby resources can be accessed anywhere within the continental US by drilling to deep, hot resources in hard, basement rock formations.

Resources

Name Format Description Link
33 PDC Bits Outperform Conventional Bit in Geothermal Drilling Project, GRC Paper, Geothermal Resources Council 2012 https://gdr.openei.org/files/140/Sandia%20et%20al_GRC2012_FINAL.pdf
33 GRC Presentation: PDC Bits Outperform Conventional Bit in Geothermal Drilling Project, Geothermal Resources Council 2012 https://gdr.openei.org/files/140/PDC%20Bits%20Outperform%20Conventional%20Bit%20in%20Geothermal%20Drilling.pdf
33 This poster sized image contains before and after pictures of two bits, high rate lateral vibration spectrums, and various instrumentation plots during drilling. Bit 1 drilled 725 feet in granitic rock. https://gdr.openei.org/files/140/Chocolate%20Mountain%20Drilling%20bit1.pdf

Tags

  • synthetic-diamond
  • drilling-records
  • southern-california
  • rate-of-penetration
  • granite
  • pictures
  • ca
  • egs
  • pdc-bit
  • performance-data
  • chocolate-mountains-drilling
  • vibration-spectrum
  • roller-cone
  • chocolate-mountains
  • california
  • drilling-charts
  • drilling
  • before-and-after
  • socal
  • lateral-vibration-spectrum
  • geothermal

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