jpt.spe.org
Microwave Drilling Sounds Like Science Fiction but So Does Drilling Down to the Hottest RockOne of the problems with geothermal is that the rock that is hot enough to create the steam needed to run a power plant is also capable of destroying drilling hardware.
I took a look at Quaise about a year ago to see if we could collaborate. There were some significant challenges in scaling this technique from the laboratory to the real world and certainly to the depths that are being hyped. For the MM wave to propagate downhole they need to have extremely tight tolerances on the ID of the pipe or tubular beyond the tolerances of even the best pipe manufactured today, they also need no gap between joints otherwise the signal is significantly attenuated, a very precise corrugated sleeve needs to be run the entire length of the string to transmit the signal. Lastly the process will generate hydrogen so how do you mange hydrogen and super hot temperatures. Saying all this the biggest competition to MM wave is conventional PDC technology and advances in Particle Impact Drilling. Conventional PDC has delivered 2000ft runs at 75 ft/Hr on Forge. (Self at al GRC Vol 45 2021) and Particle Impact Drilling/PDC hybrids are doing 48ft/Hr over 500ft (Pink et al GRC Vol 46 2022). the DOE will be a well in April and it is hoped that the ROPs will be 100ft/Hr + and over 2000ft.
@tony.pink would be good to hear your thoughts on this. As I understand it , it's not about competing with traditional bits, but being able to drill what traditional bits cannot. Would be good to hear from someone in this space.
Technologies like this (e.g. plasma) have been around since the 1970's. None of which have matured into applications. Traditional drilling with jointed. pipe has gone deeper, farther, faster than these new technologists imagined in their offset analysis. The drilling rates achieved in the granite of Utah FORGE have blown away the novel drilling projections. An issue I have with this millimeter wave technology is deployment - how will they maintain the correct stand off from the bottom hole while continuously feeding the tool, most say they will use coiled tubing but the reel will be way too large to transport, .etc. etc.....