Quote:
Originally Posted by fotze
god I wish these articles made sense. I doubt engineers concluded something that makes no literal sense. How can casing be a cement job? Wdf?
In April of this year, BP engineers concluded the casing was “unlikely to be a successful cement job,” according to a document, referring to how the casing would be sealed to prevent gases from escaping up the well.
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On deep wells like this they usually run 3 sets of casing in the hole that the blow out protecter sits on to prevent incidents like this. They start out big and get more narrow after each casing run, because the drill bit and the drill pipe have to fit inside the casing to continue drilling. After they run casing it is cemented into place. If there is not a good cement bond with the formation, gas & oil can leak up the sides of the casing, (on the out side of the cement) if there is enough pressure, making the BOP useless. Although if you have a failure in the BOP, (as in this case) it would be the same result.
I have also heard that BP has also been delaying capping the well, and leaving that as a very final solution. Meaning that they are comming up with ideas so they can still produce the oil instead of stopping the flow all together, and not being able to make money.
This mess won't be done for a while as they are waiting to drill relief wells that won't start until July/Aug, and most likely would take a few months to drill also. Makes me sad to be working in this industry, knowing that even in a disaster like this that money is still at the forefront.