Badger Explorer drills for oil and gas

Trials in Denmark of a prototype drilling tool could give hydrocarbon exploration companies a ’game changing’ technology, its developers claim.

The Badger Explorer is described by its Norwegian inventors as an autonomous ’fly-by-wire’ exploration tool that removes the need for fixed rig drilling, bringing with it the promise of huge savings in terms of time and money and its low impact on the environment.

Originally conceived in 1999 by Sigmund Stokka of Norway’s RIS-International Research Institute, up to eight Badgers will be taken to sea by boat, lowered over the side and guided to a drilling template by a remotely operated underwater vehicle (ROV).

The ROV takes Badger’s 10kV power and communication cables, which are spooled inside the tool, and secures them to a subsea power supply located near the drilling template. A further connection attaches the cables to a communications buoy. Continuous data from Badger’s sensors can be relayed via satellite to a receiver anywhere in the world, providing operators with a 3D survey of the area being explored.

Badger is lowered into a seabed-mounted drill jig or launch platform and it drills into the rock using an electrically-powered bit to loosen and crush the formation ahead of it.

It then drills vertically at an average penetration rate of two metres/hour, depending on the type of rock. Crushed debris is moved through the device and deposited in the space behind it, with the excess recompacted and forced into the rock formation through any fractures Badger has created. It is estimated that the tool will take around two months to penetrate 3,000m into the sea bed.