You may be familiar with the major oil and gas companies that explore for and produce oil and gas, but often overlooked is the vast network of oilfield services companies that provide critical support services. If you are considering a career in oil and gas or just curious about the industry, understanding what oilfield services encompasses can give helpful insight. Here are some of the types of services that are offered by companies providing oilfield services.
Well Logging Services Give Crucial Subsurface Data
Well logging services involve lowering instrumentation downhole on the end of a wireline (cable) to take measurements and collect critical data on rock properties, fluids, well conditions and more. This provides customers invaluable information to locate hydrocarbons, guide drilling decisions, and optimize production. There are many different specialized logs to generate different data points, from basic to complex, that are analyzed by experts. Well logging gives tremendous subsurface visibility without costly downtime.
Production Logging Optimizes Fluid Inflow
While drilling logging evaluates formations and fluids before production begins, production logging focuses on understanding how reservoir fluids are flowing into your well once onstream. Production logs determine exactly where in your reservoir or completion fluids are entering and at what rates. This granular inflow data enables smart interventions to remedy production problems or uneven inflow. Getting the full producing potential from new & existing wells is the end goal.
Slickline Services Enable Quick Well Interventions
Slickline consists of a non-electric cable used to lower and raise downhole tools efficiently to perform well maintenance, modifications, or basic interventions when issues arise. Slickline services are faster and more affordable than full workovers, enabling customers to fix problems and resume production rapidly. Typical slickline activities include replacing hardware, kicking-off sand or removing debris, gauging well attributes, adjusting valves/chokes, or Zea repowering downhole sensors.
Plug Setting & Retrieval Aids Well Abandonment
When a well has produced all practical hydrocarbons, plug setting procedures are performed as an intermediate step before final abandonment. Retrievable bridge plugs are commonly lowered on wireline and set at specified depths to isolate zones. This allows strategic portions of the well to be permanently plugged while preserving other areas for potential future access. Wireline-set bridge plugs also enable temporarily abandoning wells until restored production is warranted economically. They are then retrieved via wireline when resuming activity.
Perforating Enables Targeted Reservoir Access
The whole point of drilling oil & gas wells is to connect the underground reservoir to your wellbore, so hydrocarbons can flow. Wireline-conveyed perforating guns provide focused access to your target zones after drilling is done. Various specialized shaped charges are deployed at precise depths, then detonated to penetrate steel casing & cement to penetrate targeted formation intervals. This strategic reservoir connectivity maximizes your potential recovery. Modern perforating systems are incredibly sophisticated and precise.
Oilfield services companies deliver tremendous operational efficiencies and cost savings while generating the valuable subsurface data customers require for exploration, drilling, completion, and optimized production decisions. Within wireline services specifically, specialized wellbore deployments yield information superior to most surface methods. As reservoirs become more complex, wireline services give the measured insights about needed to maximize recovery, including emissions. Oilfield services constitute a technologically innovative, steadily advancing industry that makes modern oil and gas development possible.
