isol8 Present at WIA Calgary – Fusing the Wellbore Elements Together
Andrew Louden and Bill Lowry gave a joint presentation to the Well Integrity and Abandonment society in Calgary.
Bill Lowry covered his scientific journey from his work in a nuclear waste project to well plug and abandonment. Bill’s team at Olympic Research had spent 4 years and $4m in studying, developing and testing more than 35 different engineered thermite recipes that could be used to seal nuclear waste in 4000m deep boreholes. This work was invaluable in building his understanding of the reaction chemistry and limitations of thermite when applied in deep aqueous well environments.
He presented some thermite system examples; some that retain their shape after reaction, others that become liquid and he presented another engineered thermite system that rapidly expanded after ignition. He highlighted how the shape-retaining thermite could be used in solid-heater applications, whereas the more fluid systems could be used to flow through perforations into an outer annulus to enable alloy to be melted at a greater radial extent than the solid-heater. The rapidly inflating thermite system was being used in a geothermal well project to form a ceramic bridge-plug.
There was excellent attendance from the Alberta operating company representatives and serious interest in the unique approach that isol8 was developing.
Feb 18, 2019