The containment dome over the blown well in the Gulf left scientists puzzled after a day of testing gave inconclusive readings on the pressure build beneath the cap.  Engineers expected the pressure to be much higher than it is, leading them to believe there could be a leak in the sea bed.  Another reason is that the reservoir could be much lower than they were thinking.

While the leak remains the focus, even with full containment the situation in the Gulf is far from being fixed.  There is still a vast amount of oil in the Gulf itself.  The coast is literally a disaster.  Fishermen who have been in the region for generations must now leave to find employment elsewhere.  The ecosystem in the Gulf is forever changed.

The question of clean-up is overwhelming as video shows workers leaning out of boats wiping grass blades individually with paper towels in an attempt to save the grass areas.  Birds are cleaned and after a few weeks of medical care are shipped to a different area within the US and released hoping they will not return to the oil stricken area.  The smell of oil blows in with the tide to fill the beach air with an overwhelming stench of petroleum.

Farmers in the area are allowing their unused farm lands to be changed to artificial marsh lands in an attempt to intercept migratory birds that will be headed for the Gulf in the autumn.  They have no idea if it will work but they are trying to save literally thousands of birds from needing rescue later on or from dying.

BP scientists ideally want the new cap to contain 100 per cent of the oil without leaking or building up too much pressure until the relief well being drilled reaches the blown one.  This is expected to happen in August.  The cap should also allow for capture of oil from the well to then be piped to the surface to be contained in vessels.

If indeed there is a leak in the sea bed it could mean a greater problem.  Benton F. Baugh, president of Radoil Inc. Houston and a National Academy of Engineering member who specializes in underwater oil operations explained that oil leaking in the sea bed could mean a geological pocket could be filling with the oil.  As it fills, pressure could build and if the pocket cannot contain it then an underwater blowout could occur and this would be much worse than the current problem.

Of all the components on the blowout preventer, only the blind shear ram was designed to shut down the well in a blowout like the one that took place on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig on April 20. It is the only device that is supposed to cut through the thick drill pipe and seal off the hole.

Unlike many other parts of the Deepwater Horizon’s blowout preventer, the blind shear ram has no backup. The breakdown of any part of the ram can lead to disaster. One of the most critical components of the blind shear ram is the shuttle valve, the only point for the hydraulic fluid to enter the ram.

A risk analysis commissioned by the manufacturer of the blowout preventer identified this valve as one of the weakest links. As the fluid flows through the system, it has two possible pathways until it reaches the valve. So if the valve fails, the well will not be sealed.

Sources: BP; Benton Baugh, Radoil, a deepwater engineering firm; Cameron; “Marine Riser Systems and Subsea Blowout Preventers,” Petroleum Extension Service, The University of Texas at Austin and International Association of Drilling Contractors; West Engineering Services

The blowout preventer is a five-story structure that contains devices that allow well operators to maintain control of the well. Once oil, gas or other fluids are flowing, various components of the blowout preventer can be used to seal the space between the drill pipe and the well bore. But one of the structure’s most critical roles is to stave off a disaster in a blowout — the sudden release of uncontrolled oil from the well.

Sources: BP; Benton Baugh, Radoil, a deepwater engineering firm; Cameron; “Marine Riser Systems and Subsea Blowout Preventers,” Petroleum Extension Service, The University of Texas at Austin and International Association of Drilling Contractors; West Engineering Services

Testimony

Benton F. Baugh, Ph.D., P.E., NAE President Radoil, Inc.

 

(From L to R: Mr.James Pappas, Dr. Benton Baugh, Mr. Erik Milito, and Mr. Gregory McCormack) (Photo Source: Committee on Science and Technology)

I have been asked to give testimony as to whether current subsea drilling equipment is sufficiently developed to provide an adequate level of safety for deepwater drilling operations.

It is my opinion that the current state of technology of subsea drilling system is completely adequate to provide an appropriate level of safety to control wells being drilled, protect the environment, and provide safety for personnel. The basis of my opinion is more than 50 years of working in oilfield equipment design and manufacturing, receiving more than 100 U.S. patents, and having personally received a patent on almost every subassembly of a subsea drilling system.

Subsea drilling systems have existed for approximately the same period of time, from the early 60s’ when 250’ of seawater was considered ultra-deep, until now when we are drilling in 12,000’ of seawater. Overall they have an impressive safety record.  The BOP or blowout preventer stack is a piece of seafloor equipment approximately 12 foot square by 80 feet tall which typically weigh 600,000 to 800,000 lbs.  They are connected to a surface vessel by a 21” outside diameter steel riser pipe with flotation added to give it approximately a four foot diameter.

This subsea equipment business we are discussing is dominated by 3 major first level manufacturers. Each of these suppliers have highly developed and refined systems.  Each of these suppliers is ISO quality certified and follows conventional procedures of design, development, testing, and independent verification. You can fully expect that any system in the field has been tested to loads and pressures 50% higher than the loads and pressures ever anticipated to be seen in operations, and that the testing has been verified by independent third parties. You can equally well expect that the equipment is regularly tested to the maximum working pressures to confirm ongoing workability.

The company I work with is a second level company which sells large reels to each of these first level suppliers. On the first slide presented you can see a set of these reels of the type which will hold 10-12,000’ of umbilical or hose to send signals and power to the subsea BOP control pods. The second slide on the left hand side shows a copy of the ISO 9001:2008 certification which we have received to certify that we have systems in place to promote the delivery of quality products.  The right side of the same slide shows a “Type Approval” which we have received for a design, implying that not only has a 3rd party certifier checked the design, but has approved it as a type of design.  

The third slide shows a factory acceptance test or FAT test for a product, in this case a reel. On the left side is the first page of the FAT and on the right side is page number 10 of 15 pages of this FAT test. On the right side you will notice that our personnel have signed that each step has been successfully accomplished.  Each of the small round stamps indicate that our customer’s quality control personnel have witnessed and confirmed each requirement. Each of the oval stamps indicates that an independent third party, in this case the American Bureau of Shipping, has witnessed and confirmed each step. This occurs on every performance step, every pressure step, and every load step. All of our products do not require this level of quality and verification, but this is characteristic of what goes offshore.

These are the practices you would expect of the current first level suppliers.  Clearly the systems for appropriate design, testing, and verification are in place today.

The well in question does not represent a “pushing of the envelope” in terms of what has been done. It is in 5000’ of water and likely the exact rig had drilled other wells in depths greater than 10,000’. There is very little difference in drilling in 1000’ of seawater and 10,000’ of seawater. Probably the biggest difference is in what happens to the nitrogen charge in the accumulators which is well studied.  The actual cause of the current problems is not known, and may well never be known depending on how ultimate closure happens to this well. Clearly it is the confluence of a number of events, none of which may have been the fault of the drilling system.

In spite of the current difficulties with the Maconda well blowout, there have been approximately 4000 offshore wells drilled and the last significant spill from a U.S. offshore well was in the Santa Barbara Channel, about 30 years ago. This is an impressive record of complex systems handling the critical sources of energy upon which our civilization is based.

The present question is whether a work stoppage will improve or reduce safety and technology. There is not a question whether we need fossil fuels in our lifetime.  In spite of substantial investments to do so, it is clear that there will be no substitute for fossil fuels in our lifetime. A substantial work stoppage or moratorium will mean:

1. A reduction in safety because when the work restarts it will restart with a high percentage of less skilled workers. The most dangerous time for operations is when new workers start up a new task, and that is exactly what this will cause.
2. A reduction in safety because stopping drilling will cause more oil to come from foreign sources by tanker. It is far less safe for oil to be brought to the U.S. by tanker than it is to flow in a passive subsea pipeline to the shore.  In fact, the last significant spill oil spill in the U.S. was that of a tanker – the Exxon Valdez.
3. Financial damage to the work force and US companies will likely be more extensive than the oil spill itself, with no one to pay for it.

I assure you that the technology is in place and the systems are in place to do safe deepwater drilling. For these reasons I recommend:

1. The moratorium be lifted as soon as practical.
2. As equipment comes back to the surface, it be retested to confirm compliance with original factory acceptance testing and systems integration testing and have full independent 3rd party verification. If it is, the rig needs to go right back to work and continuity of the work force needs to continue.
3. All equipment and systems fabricated for collecting the present spill be captured and further developed in case another spill happens in the future.
4. Shear rams and shear ram actuators need continuing development as the wall thickness and material strength of the drill pipe is increased.
5. Tertiary back-up systems be commonly defined and implemented. 
6. ROV interface systems be further developed for a fourth level of back-up control.
7. To a large extent, if existing rules, regulations and practices are enforced the overall quality and safety of the industry will be approved.

I encourage and promote ongoing and aggressive new product development and systems upgrade, not for 6 months but forever. At this time, in the past, and in the future it has been or will be appropriate to pursue upgrades in safety and technology.  We will never reach perfection except in the smallest areas.  We need to put our people and the country back in business now, not after some future arbitrary date. 

Tyrone Benton, who worked for a subcontractor on the rig, operating underwater robots, said in a video interview that he had spotted a leak in one of two control pods in the blowout preventer weeks before the explosion and notified BP and Transocean, the rig operator.

As my colleague Ian Urbina reported in May, internal BP documents mentioned leaks in the blowout preventer.

Federal drilling records and well reports obtained through the Freedom of Information Act and BP’s internal documents, including more than 50,000 pages of company e-mail messages, inspection reports, engineering studies and other company records obtained by The Times from Congressional investigators, shed new light on the extent and timing of problems with the blowout preventer and the casing long before the explosion. [...]

The documents show that in March, after problems on the rig that included drilling mud falling into the formation, sudden gas releases known as “kicks” and a pipe falling into the well, BP officials informed federal regulators that they were struggling with a loss of “well control.” On at least three occasions, BP records indicate, the blowout preventer was leaking fluid, which the manufacturer of the device has said limits its ability to operate properly. [...]

My colleagues David Barstow, Laura Dodd, James Glanz, Stephanie Saul and Ian Urbina reported on Sunday that engineers scrambling to activate the blowout preventer days after the explosion discovered that part of its hydraulic system was leaking, “meaning pressure could not be maintained on its shearing blades,” which were supposed to cut and seal the pipe. They noted:

This leak shocked engineers because the blowout preventer’s hydraulic system was obsessively checked for leaks. “We see tests fail because the hydraulics leaked two drops,” said Benton Baugh, a leading authority on blowout preventers. Indeed, the blind shear ram had been tested for leaks only hours before the blowout, and according to Transocean, no hydraulic leaks had been detected in the weeks before the blowout.

HOUSTON -- Benton Baugh thinks big, dreams big, and when the oil companies, drillers, or rig owners have a problem they can't solve, they call him.
 
"We have a long history of being able to do this. I've been designing oil-field equipment for 50 years,” Baugh said.
 
That’s why he’s been called to Capitol Hill to testify before a hearing with the House Committee on Science and Technology

****

President Barack Obama insists that the moratorium is about safety.
 
However, Baugh thinks ultimately it carries more danger.

Before the Obama Administration sweeps under the carpet the controversy over the drilling experts it falsely used to justify its moratorium, the incident bears another look. Not least because it underlines the purely political nature of a drilling ban that now threatens the Gulf Coast economy and drilling safety.

When President Obama last month announced his six-month deepwater moratorium, he pointed to an Interior Department report of new “safety” recommendations. That report prominently noted that the recommendations it contained—including the six-month drilling ban—had been “peer-reviewed” by “experts identified by the National Academy of Engineering.” It also boasted that Interior “consulted with a wide range” of other experts. The clear implication was that the nation’s drilling brain trust agreed a moratorium was necessary.

****

We decided to call some of these experts ourselves. Their information, and concerns, are revealing.

The experts were certainly under the impression they were reviewing a comprehensive document, as some of the recommendations would take six months or even a year to implement. And the report they agreed to did address moratoria: It recommended a six-month ban on new deepwater permits. Yet Benton Baugh, president of Radoil, said that in at least two separate hour-and-a-half phone calls among Interior and the experts, there was no discussion of a moratorium on existing drilling. “Because if anybody had [made that suggestion], we’d have said ‘that’s craziness.’”

HOUSTON -- It's been 50 days, and as much a 200 million gallons of crude has spilled into the Gulf.  Of all the unanswered questions surrounding the disaster, experts say one thing is certain.

"It took a series of errors and mistakes for this to happen," said Benton Baugh.

Baugh is president of Radoil, Inc. , a Houston company that manufactures parts for deepwater offshore rigs. A member of...

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..."A six-month moratorium punishes a lot of people that did nothing wrong here and will be extremely disruptive to the oil industry and the country as a whole," Baugh.

BP engineers focused their attention Monday on a number of short-term solutions to plug the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, after attempts to cap the largest of two leaks failed over the weekend...

****

...The fact that frozen natural gas clogged the big container was not surprising, said Benton Baugh of Radoil in Houston, an expert in subsea pipeline operations, but engineers wouldn't have expected that to happen so quickly.

Crews have been using a robot submarine to try to stop an oil leak resulting from the explosion at an oil drilling platform off the coast of Louisiana. The oil is leaking nearly a mile below the surface of the Gulf of Mexico.

In case that doesn't work, BP PLC, which leased the Deepwater, moved another deepwater rig, the DD3, toward the explosion site. If necessary, the new rig would drill relief wells into the damaged well underneath the ocean floor. That could take several months.

Benton F. Baugh, who holds numerous patents for blowout preventer parts, said the subs should be able to do the job.

"If they can't get it closed off, something really unusual happened,'' said Baugh, president of Radoil Inc. in Houston and a National Academy of Engineering member.

Oil from the sunken drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico could pose an environmental threat to sensitive marshes and beaches from Louisiana east to Florida. Robot submarines are being used to activate valves at the well head. Pat Hernandez talked to an expert who hopes they cut off the leak.

When an oil platform 50-miles off the coast of New Orleans burst into flames last Tuesday, it burned for almost two days before it sank about a mile down into the sea. It raised fears about the possibility of a major oil leak from the
well below.

"There was an intense fire on the thing and so, we presumed it was a blowout rather than a rig fire, such as diesel fuel on the rig."

Benton Baugh is president of Radoil, a Houston company that makes and sells products used in deepwater drilling and blowout prevention control systems. He thinks there may have been a number of safety systems on the riser — the huge pipe that connected the rig to the seabed — that failed....

Petrobras used the world's first gimbaled J-lay tower from Houston's Radoil Inc. to install its P26/P18 subsea pipeline and connect the steel catenary riser to a P18 floating production system.

The job, completed early in 1999, was the first use of the Radoil tower. This gimbaled tower is a decided departure from the usual J-lay barge.

The tower was proposed to Petrobras and designed as a fast-track project with installation and engineering going on concurrently...

J-lay tower that can be used for a variety of offshore installations. Benton Baugh, President of Radoil, said the primary advantage of this system over conventional J-lay towers is that the multi-purpose tower will gimbal any direction up to 15 degrees, where as a conventional tower will only pivot.

Without the gimbal a pipelay barge is forced to follow the pipeline track. In heavy winds or currents this may be a difficult proposition. Baugh said this was the case with the first system they installed....