A top executive at Schlumberger NV (SLB), the world's largest energy services firm, on Monday predicted autonomous drilling of oil and gas wells will beat autonomous driving cars to market and create new efficiencies for oil producers.
Autonomous drilling is ripe for adoption by many of the world's oil majors, Abdelah Merad, an SLB executive vice-president, said at the Offshore Technology Conference (OTC).
"We believe we will be almost autonomously drilling even before we can autonomously drive," Merad told the conference.
"We already have many large customers, NOCs [national oil companies] IOCs [international oil companies] and large independents that are on the way where we are dealing with automation and autonomous drilling," he said.
Autonomous drilling will increase efficiency and with the use of artificial intelligence result in improvements in the quality of wells as each one is an improvement on the next, he said.
In January SLB announced it and Equinor drilled a well in Brazil that was more than 2.5km using autonomous control mode that resulted in a 60% increase in rate of penetration, faster well delivery and reduced cost and carbon emissions.
"Less people onsite. It is safer, it is going to be reliable," Merad told Reuters on the sidelines of the OTC conference.
Self-drilling oil wells to beat self-driving cars to market: SLB
Image: Mario Tama/Getty Images
A top executive at Schlumberger NV (SLB), the world's largest energy services firm, on Monday predicted autonomous drilling of oil and gas wells will beat autonomous driving cars to market and create new efficiencies for oil producers.
Autonomous drilling is ripe for adoption by many of the world's oil majors, Abdelah Merad, an SLB executive vice-president, said at the Offshore Technology Conference (OTC).
"We believe we will be almost autonomously drilling even before we can autonomously drive," Merad told the conference.
"We already have many large customers, NOCs [national oil companies] IOCs [international oil companies] and large independents that are on the way where we are dealing with automation and autonomous drilling," he said.
Autonomous drilling will increase efficiency and with the use of artificial intelligence result in improvements in the quality of wells as each one is an improvement on the next, he said.
In January SLB announced it and Equinor drilled a well in Brazil that was more than 2.5km using autonomous control mode that resulted in a 60% increase in rate of penetration, faster well delivery and reduced cost and carbon emissions.
"Less people onsite. It is safer, it is going to be reliable," Merad told Reuters on the sidelines of the OTC conference.
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