Water Based Mud Drilling Cuttings Management

In geotechnical engineering, drilling fluid is used to aid the drilling of boreholes into the earth, often used while drilling oil and natural gas wells and on explorationdrilling rigs, and also for much simpler boreholes like water wells. Liquid drilling fluid is often called drilling mud. The three main categories of drilling fluids are water-based mud (which can be dispersed and non-dispersed), non-aqueous mud, usually called oil-based mud, and gaseous drilling fluid, in which a wide range of gases can be used.

The main functions of drilling fluids include: providing hydrostatic pressure to prevent formation fluids from entering into the well bore, keeping the drill bit cool and clean during drilling, carrying out drill cuttings, and suspending the drill cuttings while drilling is paused and when the drilling assembly is brought in and out of the hole. The drilling fluid used for a particular job is selected to avoidformation damage and to limit corrosion.

While today, I would like to give a detailed introduction of water based mud and water based mud drilling cuttings management.

Water-based mud (WBM): most basic water-based mud systems begin with water, then clay and other chemicals are incorporated into the water to create a homogeneous blend resembling something between chocolate milk and a malt (depending on viscosity). The clay is usually a combination of native clay that are suspended in the fluid while drilling, or specific types of clay that are processed and sold as additives for the WBM system. The most common of these is bentonite, frequently referred to in the oilfield as "gel". Gel likely makes reference to the fact that while the fluid is being pumped, it can be very thin and free-flowing (like chocolate milk), though when pumping is stopped, the static fluid builds a "gel" structure that resists flow. When an adequate pumping force is applied to "break the gel", flow resumes and the fluid returns to its previously free-flowing state. Many other chemicals (e.g. potassium formate) are added to a WBM system to achieve various effects, including: viscosity control, shale stability, enhance drilling rate of penetration, cooling and lubricating of equipment.

The Water Based Mud Drilling Cuttings management equipment is used for removing the cuttings from the drilling mud and drilling fluid recovery. Professional Equipment, like decanter centrifuge, mud cleaner, vertical centrifuge and centrifugal pumps are adopted in the unit for mud collecting, mud transfer, chemical dosing, solid waste shape up, gel breaking, chemical destabilization and solids-liquids separation. The unit mainly consists of drilling cuttings handling system and liquid mud handling system. The liquid mud handling system is recovery fluid but give up solid waste, while cuttings handling system is just reverse collecting solid but disposal fluid. After the system, the solids wastes are shaped up into bricks which can be used for road spread, or operation plant building. The liquid mud is collected for further drilling with certain additives. 

KOSUN drilling waste owns the water based mud system with mature technology and practical out-standings. DWM system has a full stirring system which can efficiently mix the drilling cuttings and curing agent. The mixed solids enter the shape-up machine and be processed into bricks with good shape and high rigidity. Variable frequency centrifuge ensure a good solids-liquid separation. It can decrease the mud weight effectively. The solids come out from the centrifuge is with lower water content. Gel breaking and flocculation process are used into the unit to make sure the whole process goes smoothly. Full automatic control process, effectively save the labor cost.

Water Based Mud drilling cuttings equipment is economic and useful system for water based mud treatment. The unit is skid mounted, easy transportation for site-to-site operation. Different capacity configuration enable the unit serve both for during drilling treatment and treatment plant operation. As the space is limited on site, the shaped-up solids waste could be easy storage and further use. Meanwhile, successfully treating drilling cutting has significant meaning to the environmental protection.

Tags: drilling cuttings management, drilling cuttings treatment, drilling waste management, decanter centrifuge, vertical centrifuge, cuttings dryer, environmental protection.