Evidence That a Burning Oil Well Can Sometimes be the Best Option

Abstract

An oil well blowout can burn like a rocket, which can be a good thing. Burning leaves little or no oil behind, according to a recent study (SPE 189610). The study has been used to make a case for an oil spill response plan now before regulators to develop a field with more than 100 million bbl of reserves in the Beaufort Sea. Plan approval is one of the remaining barriers facing Hilcorp, the operator in a partnership with BP to develop the Liberty field. If there is a blowout of a well on the gravel island that will be built for the project, the plan is to minimize the impact by igniting the well, and keeping it lit until a relief well can be drilled to plug it. Spill plans based on burning have been an accepted option at other fields in that area, including the nearby Endicott field that was developed by BP and sold to Hilcorp in 2014. But unlike Liberty, Endicott is regulated by the state. In the past, burning was favored because it was a better option than trying to clean up a spill in that harsh environment, which can range from difficult to impossible. Now getting a spill plan approved by federal regulators is considerably more complicated. Regulations written since the Macondo spill in the US Gulf of Mexico require the operator to demonstrate that a spill can be cleaned up and a relief well can be drilled, said Mike Dunn, operations manager for Hilcorp’s North Slope asset management team. The plan was challenged by environmental groups, whose critical descriptions of the project took the company’s 90,000 B/D worst-case discharge estimate and assumed all of the oil would be spilled. To make its case, the partners hired Boots & Coots, one of the best-known oil well firefighting firms that is now part of Halliburton. They brought in a former rocket scientist from the US space agency, NASA, to develop a method to calculate how efficiently a well fire would burn the medium-weight crude that would likely surge out of the conventional field. The Liberty spill plan is not a new one. “Hilcorp, as well as the previous operator of the leases [BP], have determined that the best remedy for a blowout is to light the well on fire,” Dunn said.