Batch drilling, which morphs multi-pad drilling into the assembly line concept — has been around for years in older fields. After some early positive results, some smaller companies in the field are adapting the method to their operations, shaving days off the drilling process, and subsequently saving them millions of dollars. Batch drilling will not change the industry, officials say. But it does bring small efficiencies that add up over time.

HOW DOES IT WORK?

Batch drilling allows companies to assembly line their wells. The drilling rig is placed on rails, or skids, and can move side to side, with drilling pipe still attached. The concept usually works like this:

Drill the surface on one well, then slide to the next, then the next and the next, all using the same drilling mud, instead of changing out to the next formula for the middle section. Then the rig moves backward back over the wells, and drills the middle portion of each well. Then it reverses back, to drill the laterals one at a time.

Skating the rig back and forth — done by a hydraulics system rather than pulling it with a truck — has eliminated several steps and created a ton of efficiencies, Simply eliminating the build-up and take down of a rig, as it’s moved to each wellhead, represents an enormous savings. And it works best with multiple wells, at least three at a minimum.

If you bring a rig like that in for just one or two wells, batch drilling won’t save enough.

There’s also something to be said for keeping rig crews — which can experience high turnover at any given time — on one step at a time, a allowing them to retain what they learn. When the rig hands are doing the same thing over and over, they’re not switching operations from one day to the next. They do the surface on five wells so all the equipment is lined up. They know what they’re doing next, then you start the intermediate section. You don’t have to retrain for that. … The crews are more used to doing the same operation every day.

The risk is that the upfront costs are much higher than most have ever seen. Most operators, are used to spending less than $100,000 to bring a rig in to start drilling onshore. The batch drilling rig takes five days to set up and is much more expensive. Rigs capable of batch drilling are bigger, they have more equipment and require at least one crane to rig up. But the method eliminates the move time of rigging up and tearing down after each well is drilled.