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It's pretty amazing how sealed this well is. Look at the BOP, a ~4,600 PSI differential (6,800 internal vs 2,200 external), and you only have afew microscopic methane bubbles around some joints. Some impressive engineering given the conditions.
And realistically, this whole concept of a "seep" afew football fields from the BOP has to be natural. I believe the reservoir pressure was initially read at ~12,000psi by the Horizon. If you take 6,800psi + 4,500psi (the pressure from the weight of 13,000ft oil in the pipe with specgrav of 0.80), then you really are only short ~500 psi, max.
I can't legitimately expect 500psi being anywhere near enough to push gas and oil thru 1-3 miles of bedrock, let alone 300 yards laterally as well. If there was a weakness, the easiest path for the g&o would be around the casing right under the BOP, which hasn't occured. Bedrock splitting pressure is on the order of volcanic activity, which is on the order of MILLIONS of psi, not thousands.
just an interested engineer's point of view.
- cleanuptime on July 19, 2010 - 11:24am
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