In today’s fast-paced oil and gas industry, companies are constantly innovating to maximize efficiency, reduce costs, and minimize environmental impact. A few powerful strategies—stacked formations, cube development, optimized drilling, and advanced completions—are proving invaluable. Let’s dive into how these methods are reshaping the oil and gas landscape and Ovintiv’s outlook on this evolving approach.

1. Stacked Formations: Unlocking Multiple Layers of Potential

Stacked formations refer to geologic layers of oil and gas reservoirs that lie on top of each other, offering multiple potential zones for drilling within a single geographic location. This unique setup allows companies like Ovintiv to access various reservoirs from the same surface point.

Benefits:

Maximized Resource Extraction: Companies can drill horizontally through each layer, accessing different reserves without needing additional surface locations.
Reduced Environmental Impact: Fewer drilling sites mean less land disturbance, a critical advantage in areas with stringent environmental regulations or community interests.
Cost Savings: By accessing multiple layers through one setup, companies save on surface equipment and infrastructure.

In areas like the Anadarko Basin and the Montney Formation, Ovintiv leverages these stacked layers to increase the value and productivity of each drilling site.

2. Cube Development: A Comprehensive Approach to Multi-Layer Extraction

Cube development is Ovintiv’s innovative approach to managing and developing stacked reservoirs. This technique involves drilling multiple wells from a single pad across several stacked layers simultaneously, allowing for efficient and maximized production.

How It Works:

Simultaneous Drilling and Completions: Rather than sequentially drilling one layer after another, cube development allows for drilling multiple layers at once.
Enhanced Resource Recovery: By developing all layers simultaneously, companies minimize interference between wells and ensure a more consistent, optimal extraction of hydrocarbons from each layer.
Increased Capital Efficiency: Since companies can develop multiple reservoirs with a single setup, they spend less on infrastructure and surface operations.

This method has proven highly effective in areas with substantial stacked potential, such as the Montney and the Permian Basin, where Ovintiv has implemented cube development to great success.

3. Drilling Advancements: Precision, Speed, and Efficiency

Drilling technology has come a long way in the past decade, with faster and more precise techniques that ensure optimal placement within stacked reservoirs.

Key Developments:

Longer Laterals: Companies like Ovintiv drill longer lateral wells to increase exposure to the resource, particularly effective within cube development strategies. In the Permian Basin, for instance, Ovintiv has drilled some of the longest laterals, maximizing resource access within each layer.
High Drilling Speeds: By improving rig technology and employing data analytics, Ovintiv has achieved impressive drilling speeds, reducing time and costs significantly. The company has recorded some of the fastest drilling rates, a testament to the efficiency and precision of modern rigs.

4. Advanced Completion Techniques: Maximizing Production

After drilling, the completion phase is essential for maximizing well productivity. Advanced completions allow Ovintiv to optimize production from each well in a cube.

Completion Innovations:

Frac Optimization: The use of advanced hydraulic fracturing (or fracking) techniques, such as simul-frac, has improved well output by creating better reservoir contact. Ovintiv employs these methods to ensure that each layer is fractured effectively without interfering with others.
Trimulfrac Technology: This advanced fracking approach has enabled Ovintiv to reduce completion times significantly, increasing the pace at which wells are brought online and improving returns on investment.

5. Outlook: A Focus on Efficiency and Sustainable Production

The outlook for these techniques is promising. As companies continue to develop resources within stacked reservoirs, cube development, advanced drilling, and optimized completions will play an essential role in maximizing efficiency and production. Ovintiv’s investments in these areas signal a strong commitment to capital efficiency and operational excellence, ensuring resilience even in fluctuating market conditions.

Strategic Focus:

Resilient Production: By investing in stacked and cube development, Ovintiv is prepared to meet production targets with higher certainty.
Sustainability: These innovations reduce the environmental footprint by minimizing the number of drilling sites and maximizing each well’s output.
Cost Management: Through efficient drilling and completions, Ovintiv is set to maintain strong financial performance by keeping operational costs low while enhancing production.

Conclusion

The combination of stacked formations, cube development, advanced drilling, and completion techniques represents a revolution in oil and gas production. As companies like Ovintiv continue to refine these methods, they unlock greater value, reduce costs, and achieve production goals more sustainably. The future of the oil and gas industry will undoubtedly lean on these innovative approaches to provide reliable, efficient, and responsible energy production.