METHODS, SYSTEMS, AND COMPUTER-READABLE MEDIA FOR HORIZONTAL WELL DEVELOPMENT PLANNING AND OTHER RESOURCE CONSTRAINED OPERATIONAL PLANNING

• US 20140025413A1
• Filed: 07/18/2012
• Published: 01/23/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 07/18/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Atlas Planning Solutions LLC
• Original Assignee: Atlas Planning Solutions LLC
• Inventors: Yeager, Justin
• Granted Patent: US 10,423,903 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/7.12
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0631 Resource planning, allocation, distributing or scheduling for enterprises or organisations

Abstract

Methods and systems for identifying potential simultaneous operational conflicts among a plurality of assets in a project. One method includes storing operational scheduling data for a project having one or more project assets, the project assets able to perform a plurality of operational activities at defined coordinates, in a scheduling database, and storing project-specific variables for the project in an external data source. A database query is then performed of the scheduling database and the external data source using a computer, returning all possible combinations of the operational activities, including defining a common reference, calculating distances from each defined coordinate to each other defined coordinate, and filtering the calculated distances to filter out potential operational conflicts, for example distances greater than one or more user-defined buffer distances. Potential simultaneous operational conflicts may be displayed in tabular or graphical form on a user interface electronically connected to the computer.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

a) storing operational scheduling data for a project having one or more project assets, the project assets able to perform a plurality of operational activities at defined coordinates, in a scheduling database;

b) storing project-specific variables for the project in an external data source;

c) executing a database query of the scheduling database and the external data source using a computer, returning all possible combinations of the plurality of operational activities, including;

i) defining a common reference;

ii) calculating distances from each defined coordinate to each other defined coordinate;

iii) filtering the calculated distances to filter out potential operational activity conflicts selected from the group consisting of one or more user defined distances, operational activities having no time conflicts, and distances greater than one or more user-defined buffer distances; and

d) identifying potential simultaneous operational activity conflicts using a tabular output format displayed on a user interface electronically connected to the computer.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the project is selected from the group consisting of hydrocarbon exploration projects, hydrocarbon production projects, hydrocarbon well drilling projects, hydrocarbon well completion projects, hydrocarbon well intervention projects, hydrocarbon containment and disposal projects, projects involving two or more of these types of projects simultaneously in time and at nearby Earth coordinates, and projects involving two or more of these types of projects nearly simultaneously in time and at nearby Earth coordinates.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein the project comprises hydrocarbon horizontal drilling, hydrocarbon production, and hydrocarbon well completion, wherein at least one or more of the well completions involves hydraulic fracturing.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the project is a hydrocarbon production project.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the project is a resource exploration project.

6. The method of claim 2 wherein the defining of a common reference comprises creating a table of drilling coordinates and fracturing coordinates, wherein the drilling coordinates are on a left side of the table and the fracturing coordinates are on a right side of the table.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein the identifying of potential simultaneous operational conflicts using a tabular output format displayed on a user interface electronically connected to the computer comprises a user using a wireless connection between the user interface and the computer.

8. The method of claim 1 wherein the filtering the calculated distances to filter out potential operational conflicts comprises filtering one or more user defined distances from an operator'"'"'s own well and pad operations.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein the computer is selected from the group consisting of a hand-held computer, a laptop computer, a desktop computer, and a tablet computer.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein the one or more project assets are selected from the group consisting of one or more drilling rigs, one or more slurry blenders, one or more high-pressure, high-volume fracturing pumps, one or more monitoring units, one or more fracturing tanks, one or more units for storage and handling of proppant, high-pressure treating iron, one or more chemical additive units to accurately monitor chemical addition, low-pressure flexible hoses, and gauges and meters for flow rate, fluid density, and treating pressure.

11. The method of claim 5 wherein the project is an offshore seismic exploration project, and the one or more project assets are selected from the group consisting of one or more vessels, one or more streamer cables containing acoustic and/or electromagnetic (EM) seismic receivers deployed into water behind one or more of the vessels, one or more seismic sources towed by the same or different vessel, wherein the vessels, streamers, and sources define a seismic spread, one or more GPS receivers at strategic points in the spread to determine the surface position of a vessel, one or more buoys tethered to streamers and sources, one or more streamer controllers, one or more deflectors for pulling streamers laterally, one or more lateral source steering mechanisms, and one or more winch mechanisms.

12. A method comprising:

a) storing operational scheduling data for a project having one or more project assets, the project assets able to perform a plurality of operational activities at defined state plane coordinates, in a scheduling database;

b) storing project-specific variables for the project in an external data source;

c) transforming, using software accessible by the computer, the state plane coordinates from a state plane coordinate system to Earth coordinates in an Earth coordinate system specified for a computer language able to express geographic annotation and visualization within one or more Internet-based, two-dimensional electronic maps and/or three-dimensional electronic Earth browsers displayed on a viewer electronically connected to the computer, thus forming a transformed scheduling database;

d) executing a database query of the transformed scheduling database and the external data source using a computer, returning all possible combinations of the plurality of operational activities, including;

i) defining a common reference;

ii) calculating distances from each Earth coordinate to all other Earth coordinates;

iii) filtering the calculated distances to filter out potential operational activity conflicts selected from the group consisting of one or more user defined distances, operational activities having no time conflicts, and distances greater than one or more user-defined buffer distances;

e) formatting unique icons for each operational activity and placing the icons on the electronic map and/or electronic Earth browser using the viewer and a user interface electronically connected to the computer;

f) specifying one or more Earth coordinates and/or geometries for each operational activity and placing these on the electronic map and/or electronic Earth browser using the viewer and user interface;

g) specifying visual buffer area geometries for the project assets according to the state plane coordinates using the user interface;

h) visually overlaying one or more of the visual buffer area geometries on one or more of the project assets and operational activities using the viewer and user interface; and

i) visually identifying potential simultaneous operational activity conflicts by viewing the overlaid visual buffer areas using the viewer.

13. The method of claim 12 wherein the project is selected from the group consisting of hydrocarbon exploration projects, hydrocarbon production projects, hydrocarbon well drilling projects, hydrocarbon well completion projects, hydrocarbon well intervention projects, hydrocarbon containment and disposal projects, projects involving two or more of these types of projects simultaneously in time and at nearby Earth coordinates, and projects involving two or more of these types of projects nearly simultaneously in time and at nearby Earth coordinates.

14. The method of claim 13 wherein the project comprises hydrocarbon horizontal drilling, hydrocarbon production, and hydrocarbon well completion, wherein at least one or more of the well completions involves hydraulic fracturing.

15. The method of claim 12 wherein the project is a hydrocarbon production project.

16. The method of claim 12 wherein the project is a resource exploration project.

17. The method of claim 12 wherein the computer language able to express geographic annotation and visualization within one or more Internet-based, two-dimensional electronic maps and/or three-dimensional electronic Earth browsers is keynote markup language (KML).

18. The method of claim 12 wherein the formatting of unique icons for each operational activity and placing the icons on the electronic map and/or browser using the viewer comprises the user interface being wirelessly connected to the computer.

19. The method of claim 12 comprising transforming the state plane coordinates from the state plane coordinate system to a world geodetic system.

20. A method comprising:

a) forming a first database of estimated dates of first production of a product or service from a plurality of project assets, and a second database of type curves for the project assets;

b) performing a Cartesian join of the first and second databases to obtain a Cartesian product;

c) summing results of the Cartesian product to obtain a third database of aggregate production rates at each project asset;

d) executing a database query of the third database at each project asset using a computer, returning aggregate production rates for each project asset for a user-defined time period;

e) comparing, using the computer, the aggregate production rates of each project asset to a project asset maximum rate for each project asset stored in the second database;

f) displaying, on a user interface electronically connected to the computer, a “

percent loaded value”

for one or more of the project assets per user-selected time period; and

g) forecasting, using the computer, a “

100 percent loaded”

date for one or more of the project assets.

21. The method of claim 20 comprising a hydrocarbon production method, wherein the forming the first database of estimated dates of first production of the product from a plurality of project assets comprises forming a database of estimated dates of first production of hydrocarbons from a plurality of hydrocarbon production project assets, and the second database of type curves for the project assets comprises a database of hydrocarbon production rates from the plurality of hydrocarbon production project assets.

22. The method of claim 20 comprising a hydrocarbon horizontal drilling and fracturing method, wherein the forming the first database of estimated dates of first production of the product from a plurality of project assets comprises forming a database of estimated dates of first production of hydrocarbons from a plurality of hydrocarbon production project assets, and the second database of type curves for the facilities comprises a database of hydrocarbon production rates from the plurality of hydrocarbon production project assets.

23. The method of claim 20 wherein the user interface and the computer are wirelessly electronically connected.

24. The method of claim 20 wherein the computer is selected from the group consisting of a hand-held computer, a laptop computer, a desktop computer, and a tablet computer.

25. A computer-readable medium encoded with processing instructions for implementing a method of planning and/or scheduling a project, the method comprising:

a) storing operational scheduling data for the project having one or more project assets, the project assets able to perform a plurality of operational activities at defined coordinates, in a scheduling database;

b) storing project-specific variables for the project in an external data source;

c) executing a database query of the scheduling database and the external data source using a computer, returning all possible combinations of the plurality of operational activities, including;

i) defining a common reference;

ii) calculating distances from each defined coordinate to each other defined coordinate;

iii) filtering the calculated distances to filter out potential operational activity conflicts selected from the group consisting of one or more user defined distances, operational activities having no time conflicts, and distances greater than one or more user-defined buffer distances; and

d) identifying potential simultaneous operational activity conflicts using a tabular output format displayed on a user interface electronically connected to the computer.

26. The method of claim 25 wherein the project is selected from the group consisting of hydrocarbon exploration projects, hydrocarbon production projects, hydrocarbon well drilling projects, hydrocarbon well completion projects, hydrocarbon well intervention projects, hydrocarbon containment and disposal projects, projects involving two or more of these types of projects simultaneously in time and at nearby Earth coordinates, and projects involving two or more of these types of projects nearly simultaneously in time and at nearby Earth coordinates.

27. A computer-readable medium encoded with processing instructions for implementing a method of planning and/or scheduling for a project, the method comprising:

a) storing operational scheduling data for the project having one or more project assets, the project assets able to perform a plurality of operational activities at defined state plane coordinates, in a scheduling database;

b) storing project-specific variables for the project in an external data source;

c) transforming, using software accessible by the computer, the state plane coordinates from a state plane coordinate system to Earth coordinates in an Earth coordinate system specified for a computer language able to express geographic annotation and visualization within one or more Internet-based, two-dimensional electronic maps and/or three-dimensional electronic Earth browsers displayed on a viewer electronically connected to the computer, thus forming a transformed scheduling database;

d) executing a database query of the transformed scheduling database and the external data source using the computer, returning all possible combinations of the plurality of operational activities, including;

i) defining a common reference;

ii) calculating distances from each Earth coordinate to all other Earth coordinates;

iii) filtering the calculated distances to filter out potential operational activity conflicts selected from the group consisting of one or more user defined distances, operational activities having no time conflicts, and distances greater than one or more user-defined buffer distances;

e) formatting unique icons for each operational activity and placing the icons on the electronic map and/or electronic Earth browser using the viewer and a user interface electronically connected to the computer;

f) specifying one or more Earth coordinates and/or geometries for each operational activity and placing these on the electronic map and/or electronic Earth browser using the viewer and user interface;

g) specifying visual buffer area geometries for the project assets according to the state plane coordinates using the user interface;

h) visually overlaying one or more of the visual buffer area geometries on one or more of the project assets and operational activities using the viewer and user interface; and

i) visually identifying potential simultaneous operational activity conflicts by viewing the overlaid visual buffer areas using the viewer.

28. The method of claim 27 wherein the project is selected from the group consisting of hydrocarbon exploration projects, hydrocarbon production projects, hydrocarbon well drilling projects, hydrocarbon well completion projects, hydrocarbon well intervention projects, hydrocarbon containment and disposal projects, projects involving two or more of these types of projects simultaneously in time and at nearby Earth coordinates, and projects involving two or more of these types of projects nearly simultaneously in time and at nearby Earth coordinates.

29. A computer-readable medium encoded with processing instructions for implementing a method of forecasting a “

100 percent loaded”

date of one or more project assets, the method comprising;

a) forming a first database of estimated dates of first production of a product or service from a plurality of project assets, and a second database of type curves for the project assets;

b) performing a Cartesian join of the first and second databases to obtain a Cartesian product;

c) summing results of the Cartesian product to obtain a third database of aggregate production rates at each project asset;

d) executing a database query of the third database at each project asset using a computer, returning aggregate production rates for each project asset for a user-defined time period;

e) comparing, using the computer, the aggregate production rates of each project asset to a project asset maximum rate for each project asset stored in the second database;

f) displaying, on a user interface electronically connected to the computer, a “

percent loaded value”

for one or more of the project assets per user-selected time period; and

g) forecasting, using the computer, a “

100 percent loaded”

date for one or more of the project assets.

30. A data processing system to enable methods of planning and/or scheduling for a project, the system comprising:

a) a data storage unit having stored therein operational scheduling data for the project having one or more project assets, the project assets able to perform a plurality of operational activities at defined state plane coordinates, in a scheduling database;

b) an external data source unit having stored therein project-specific variables for the project; and

c) a computer, electronically connected to the data storage unit and the external data source, that is configured to;

(i) transform, using software accessible by the computer, the state plane coordinates from a state plane coordinate system to Earth coordinates in an Earth coordinate system specified for a computer language able to express geographic annotation and visualization within one or more Internet-based, two-dimensional electronic maps and/or three-dimensional electronic Earth browsers displayed on a viewer electronically connected to the computer, thus forming a transformed scheduling database;

(ii) execute a database query of the transformed scheduling database and the external data source using the computer, returning all possible combinations of the plurality of operational activities, including;

a) defining a common reference;

b) calculating distances from each Earth coordinate to all other Earth coordinates;

c) filtering the calculated distances to filter out potential operational activity conflicts selected from the group consisting of one or more user defined distances, operational activities having no time conflicts, and distances greater than one or more user-defined buffer distances;

(iii) format unique icons for each operational activity and placing the icons on the electronic map and/or electronic Earth browser using the viewer and a user interface electronically connected to the computer;

(iv) specify one or more Earth coordinates and/or geometries for each operational activity and placing these on the electronic map and/or electronic Earth browser using the viewer and user interface;

(v) specify visual buffer area geometries for the project assets according to the state plane coordinates using the user interface;

(vi) visually overlay one or more of the visual buffer area geometries on one or more of the project assets and operational activities using the viewer and user interface; and

(vii) visually identify potential simultaneous operational activity conflicts by viewing the overlaid visual buffer areas using the viewer.