Gas Migrating Below Gulf Seafloor, Boots And Coots To The Rescue

After an Apache Corporation Gulf of Mexico well aproximately 50 miles east of Venice was evacuated due to an uncontrolled gas flow after a blowout preventer (BOP) was activated, divers have been looking for a seabed floor rupture and Halliburton company Boots and Coots have been contracted to help stop the gas leak that has migrated.

A natural gas well located approximately 50 miles east of Venice in the Gulf of Mexico is releasing uncontrolled gas and has been evacuated, according to a report in Fuel Fix, an energy website operated in part by Houston Chronicle.

Tests show that natural gas has migrated from the 8300-foot well to a sand formation approximately 1100 feet below the seabed.

This uncontrolled gas flow happened after a blowout preventer was activated, according to reports.

Fifteen workers were then evacuated from the Ensco 87 rig in 218 feet of water. 

“Problems first arose on Feb. 4, when workers on the Ensco 87 jackup rig detected a kick, or uncontrolled flow of fluid, in the well,” reports the Fuel Fix. “In response, they activated a blowout preventer, which apparently was successful in keeping natural gas from escaping the well. However later testing revealed that gas had migrated from the bottom of the roughly 8,300-foot well to a shallower sand formation 1,100 feet below the seabed.”

Offshore Magazine reported that the drilling rig experienced what Apache described in a statement as “a kick from an abnormally pressured gas zone” on February 5.

The Apache Corp. detected an underground flow of natural gas at the site of a shallow-water exploratory well in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, the company and U.S. regulators said,” reported the Wall St. Journal.

The Houston-based Apache is working with well-control experts to stop the flow of natural gas below the seafloor and at the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement ( BSEE) direction, Apache is readying another rig to bring to the site in case a relief well needs to be drilled.

The Houston-based Apache Corp. has brought in Halliburton’s Boots and Coots well control experts to kill the well and it had mobilized the Rowan Cecil Provine rig to the site in case a relief well needs to be drilled.

“Once we realized this was unconventional, we started having more discussions (with regulators),” said John Roper, Apache spokesman.

Roper said, “We evacuated non-essential personnel, we brought in the experts and we notified the government.”

The BSEE, that oversees the safety of offshore operations, said in a statement on its website that Apache successfully activated the blow-out preventer on the drilling rig to prevent natural gas from flowing to the surface, according to Fox Business.

Contracted divers report there is no breach of the sea floor.

After flying over the site Thursday, the federal BSEE said it “detected no gas at the seafloor and no sign of pollution at the location,” the Houston Chronicle reports.

Apache is the largest producer in the shallow waters of the Gulf of Mexico shelf.

Former drilling regulator Michael Bromwich, now a consultant in Washington said this incident is a “sobering reminder that offshore drilling is an inherently risky activity.

“It undermines the often-repeated but erroneous claim that drilling in shallow water has few risks, and reinforces the conclusion that heightened safety and environmental standards should be applied across the board.”

“A relief well — drilled to intersect the existing well at the site — could become necessary, if the well cannot be killed through other means, such as by circulating heavy fluids into the well,” the Fuel Fix reports Sat.  ”A relief well would allow an alternate path for pumping heavy drilling muds and cement at the site.”

BP, Apache and Gulf Gas

In 2010 after the BP-wrecked Macondo oil well began spewing gas and oil into the Gulf of Mexico in the nation’s worst environmental catastrophe, there was 3000 times more natural gas coming out of the leak than oil, according to Dr. Samantha Joye of the University of Georgia Department of Marine Sciences.

The damage of the massive amounts of gas being released into the Gulf has been worse than the oil, according to Joye, who has been studying the water column and seafloor impacts of the 2010 BP Gulf of Mexico oil catastrophe.

“Oxygen levels in some areas have dropped 30 percent, and should continue to drop,” Joye had said. ”It could take years, possibly decades, for the system to recover from an infusion of this quantity of oil and gas.

“We’ve never seen anything like this before. It’s impossible to fathom the impact,” said Joye.

The closer to the leaking Macondo well, the stronger the gas concentrations, according to Joye. 

The BP wrecked Macondo well is approximately 41 miles from Louisiana’s coast.

Boots & Coots, a Halliburton company, oversaw the drilling of a relief well after the BP catastrophe began in 2010 in the Gulf of Mexico.

BP announced on July 20, 2010 that it agreed to sell upstream assets in the United States, Canada and Egypt to Apache Corporation.

“The deals, together worth a total of $7 billion, comprise BP’s Permian Basin assets in Texas and south-east New Mexico, US; its Western Canadian upstream gas assets; and the Western Desert business concessions and East Badr El-din exploration concession in Egypt,” BP said on its website. 

That decision followed BP’s announcement in June that it was increasing its target for divestments to $10 billion. The proceeds of the sales were to be be used by BP to increase the cash available to cover its Gulf catastrophe.

BP Chairman, Carl-Henric Svanberg had said: “Over the last two months the Board has considered BP’s options for generating the cash necessary to meet the obligations likely to arise from the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. BP has an extremely strong asset base which is diversified geographically as well as by asset class.

“The Board believes that there are opportunities to divest assets which are strategically more valuable to other parties than they are to BP. Today’s announcement is the first such transaction and meets the value and strategic criteria of both parties.”

“This transaction provides a sustainable growth platform for Apache’s onshore North America operations as well as strategic infrastructure and exploration potential in Egypt,” Apache chairman and chief executive officer G. Steven Farris had said. “We appreciate the opportunity and the professional manner in which BP employees conducted themselves. Their cooperation was a key ingredient for this transaction to come together.”

Meanwhile, scientists were finding that since the Macondo well was wrecked, spewing gas was more of a problem than the gushing oil in many respects. 

On the evening of April 20, 2010, a gas release and subsequent explosion occurred on Transocean’s Deepwater Horizon oil rig leased by BP to work on the Macondo exploration well.

On May 25, Joye, chief scientist, began a cruise aboard the R/V Walton Smith with funding from a National Science Foundation Rapid grant. University of Georgia scientists were joined by scientists from the University of North Carolina, the University of Mississippi, the University of California, and WETLABS, Inc.

The research team continued mapping and tracking the hydrocarbon plume and began detailed studies of the microbiology of the feature. They’ve made multiple cruises since then to gather samples and compile data regarding the fate of the oil and gas.

In 2010, the amount of oil leaking into the Gulf was estimated to be 25,000 to 70,000 barrels.  

“A 3000:1 ratio would mean 75 – 210 million cubic feet of gas per day released. There are 44,872 cubic feet of natural gas in one metric ton of gas (STP). That means 1,671 to 4,680  metric tons of gas released daily. (75,000,000 divided by 44,872 = 1,671)” – as reported on the Jeff Rense website in an wrticle about Joye’s findings.

“The story continues, and its end is not within sight,” Joye says on her website.