IP Library › Granted Patent US 12,378,861
Granted Patent B2
US 12,378,861 · App. 18/623,686 · Granted Aug 5, 2025

Coordinated pumping operations

Inventors: Richard Christie (Sugar Land, TX); Florence Binet (Antony, FR)
Assignee: Schlumberger Technology Corporation
E21B43/26E21B43/2607
View Patent ↗
Loading inventors, assignments & file history…
Monitor This Case
Get email alerts when status or documents change.
Order Certified Copies
Most orders are placed with the USPTO same day — all within 24 business hours.
Order via The Patent Place →
Pre-filled with this patent's details
Quick Facts
Patent No.
US 12,378,861
App. No.
18/623,686
Granted
Aug 5, 2025
Kind
B2
Abstract

Systems and methods presented herein enable coordinated pumping operations. An example system may include a treatment fluid system configured to pump a treatment fluid into a wellbore, a pump-down system configured to pump a pump-down fluid into the wellbore to convey a perforating tool, a fluid valve system configured to selectively fluidly connect and disconnect the treatment fluid system and the pump-down system to and from the wellbore, and a controller communicatively connected to the treatment fluid system, the pump-down system, and the fluid valve system. The controller may be configured to monitor operational status of the treatment fluid system, the pump-down system, and the fluid valve system, and control operations of the treatment fluid system, the pump-down system, and the fluid valve system based at least in part on the operational status of the treatment fluid system, the pump-down system, and the fluid valve system.

Claims (57)

1. A system, comprising:

a fluid valve system configured to selectively fluidly connect, disconnect, and distribute a fluid from one or more surface fluid delivery systems to and from a plurality of wellbores extending into a subterranean formation from a surface of an oil and gas wellsite; and

a controller comprising at least one processor and at least one memory storing processor-executable instructions, wherein the controller is communicatively connected to the fluid valve system and the one or more surface fluid delivery systems, and wherein the processor-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the controller to:

monitor operational statuses of the fluid valve system and the one or more surface fluid delivery systems; and

control operations of the fluid valve system based at least in part on the operational statuses of the fluid valve system and the one or more surface fluid delivery systems.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the fluid valve system comprises:

a first fluid control valve fluidly connected between a first surface fluid delivery system of the one or more surface fluid delivery systems and the wellbore, wherein the first fluid control valve is configured to selectively fluidly connect and disconnect the first surface fluid delivery system to and from the wellbore, and wherein the first fluid control valve is connected to a wellhead associated with the wellbore; and

a second fluid control valve fluidly connected between a second surface fluid delivery system of the one or more surface fluid delivery systems and the wellbore, wherein the second fluid control valve is configured to selectively fluidly connect and disconnect the second surface fluid delivery system to and from the wellbore, and wherein the second fluid control valve is connected to the wellhead.

3. The system of claim 2 , wherein the fluid valve system comprises one or more interlock valves configured to isolate the first and second surface fluid delivery systems from each other when swapping between the first and second surface fluid delivery systems being fluidly connected and disconnected to and from the wellbore.

4. The system of claim 1 , wherein the processor-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the controller to operate the fluid valve system to alternatingly connect and disconnect a treatment fluid system and a pump-down system of the one or more surface fluid delivery systems to and from the wellbore.

5. The system of claim 4 , wherein the processor-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the controller to operate the fluid valve system to:

open a first valve of the fluid valve system to fluidly connect the treatment fluid system to the wellbore during well treatment operations performed by the treatment fluid system;

close a second valve of the fluid valve system to fluidly disconnect the pump-down system from the wellbore during the well treatment operations performed by the treatment fluid system;

open the second valve of the fluid valve system to fluidly connect the pump-down system to the wellbore during pump-down operations performed by the pump-down system; and

close the first valve of the fluid valve system to fluidly disconnect the treatment fluid system from the wellbore during the pump-down operations performed by the pump-down system.

6. The system of claim 4 , wherein the processor-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the controller to:

after treatment fluid is pumped into the wellbore from the treatment fluid system:

operate the fluid valve system to fluidly disconnect the treatment fluid system from the wellbore; and

operate the fluid valve system to fluidly connect the pump-down system to the wellbore; and

after pump-down fluid is pumped into the wellbore from the pump-down system and a perforating tool is retrieved from the wellbore:

operate the fluid valve system to fluidly disconnect the pump-down system from the wellbore; and

operate the fluid valve system to fluidly connect the treatment fluid system to the wellbore.

7. The system of claim 1 , and wherein the processor-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the controller to:

monitor operational statuses of the fluid valve system and the one or more surface fluid delivery systems with respect to each wellbore; and

control operations of the fluid valve system with respect to each wellbore based at least in part on the operational statuses of the fluid valve system and the one or more surface fluid delivery systems, thereby facilitating distributed injection of a treatment fluid from the surface fluid delivery systems into the plurality of wellbores.

8. The system of claim 1 , wherein the operational statuses of the fluid valve system comprise valve positions of valves of the fluid valve system that are monitored by the controller in substantially real time.

9. The system of claim 1 , wherein the controller is configured to remotely control the operations of the fluid valve system.

10. A method, comprising:

monitoring, using a controller, operational statuses of a fluid valve system and one or more surface fluid delivery systems; and

controlling, using the controller, operations of the fluid valve system to selectively fluidly connect, disconnect, and distribute fluid from the one or more surface fluid delivery systems to and from a plurality of wellbores extending into a subterranean formation from a surface of an oil and gas wellsite based at least in part on the operational statuses of the fluid valve system and the one or more surface fluid delivery systems.

11. The method of claim 10 , comprising:

operating a first fluid control valve of the fluid valve system to selectively fluidly connect and disconnect a first surface fluid delivery system of the one or more surface fluid delivery systems to and from the wellbore, wherein the first fluid control valve is connected to a wellhead associated with the wellbore; and

operating a second fluid control valve of the fluid valve system to selectively fluidly connect and disconnect a first surface fluid delivery system of the one or more surface fluid delivery systems to and from the wellbore, wherein the second fluid control valve is connected to the wellhead.

12. The method of claim 10 , comprising operating, using the controller, the fluid valve system to alternatingly connect and disconnect a treatment fluid system and a pump-down system of the one or more surface fluid delivery systems to and from the wellbore.

13. The method of claim 12 , comprising:

opening, using the controller, a first valve of the fluid valve system to fluidly connect the treatment fluid system to the wellbore during well treatment operations performed by the treatment fluid system;

closing, using the controller, a second valve of the fluid valve system to fluidly disconnect the pump-down system from the wellbore during the well treatment operations performed by the treatment fluid system;

opening, using the controller, the second valve of the fluid valve system to fluidly connect the pump-down system to the wellbore during pump-down operations performed by the pump-down system; and

closing, using the controller, the first valve of the fluid valve system to fluidly disconnect the treatment fluid system from the wellbore during the pump-down operations performed by the pump-down system.

14. The method of claim 12 , comprising:

after treatment fluid is pumped into the wellbore from the treatment fluid system:

operating, using the controller, the fluid valve system to fluidly disconnect the treatment fluid system from the wellbore; and

operating, using the controller, the fluid valve system to fluidly connect the pump-down system to the wellbore; and

after pump-down fluid is pumped into the wellbore from the pump-down system and a perforating tool is retrieved from the wellbore:

operating, using the controller, the fluid valve system to fluidly disconnect the pump-down system from the wellbore; and

operating, using the controller, the fluid valve system to fluidly connect the treatment fluid system to the wellbore.

15. The method of claim 10 , wherein the wellbore is one of a plurality of wellbores, and wherein the method comprises:

monitoring, using the controller, operational statuses of the fluid valve system and the one or more surface fluid delivery systems with respect to each wellbore; and

controlling, using the controller, operations of the fluid valve system with respect to each wellbore based at least in part on the operational statuses of the fluid valve system and the one or more surface fluid delivery systems and thereby facilitating distributed injection of a treatment fluid from the surface fluid delivery systems into the plurality of wellbores.

16. The method of claim 10 , wherein the operational statuses of the fluid valve system comprise valve positions of valves of the fluid valve system that are monitored by the controller in substantially real time.

17. The method of claim 10 , comprising remotely controlling, via the controller, the operations of the fluid valve system.

18. A surface fluid valve control system, comprising:

a controller comprising at least one processor and at least one memory storing executable processor-executable instructions, wherein the controller is configured to be communicatively connected to a fluid valve system and one or more surface fluid delivery systems, and wherein the processor-executable instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the controller to:

monitor operational statuses of the fluid valve system and the one or more surface fluid delivery systems; and

control operations of the fluid valve system to selectively fluidly connect, disconnect, and distribute fluid from the one or more surface fluid delivery systems to and from a plurality of wellbores extending into a subterranean formation from a surface of an oil and gas wellsite based at least in part on the operational statuses of the fluid valve system and the one or more surface fluid delivery systems, thereby facilitating distributed injection of a treatment fluid from the surface fluid delivery systems into the plurality of wellbores.

19. The surface fluid valve control system of claim 18 , wherein the operational statuses of the fluid valve system comprise valve positions of valves of the fluid valve system that are monitored by the controller in substantially real time.

20. The surface fluid valve control system of claim 18 , wherein the controller is configured to remotely control the operations of the fluid valve system.

Continuity (4)
Continuation 17808787 · Jun 24, 2022
Continuation 16937681 · Jul 24, 2020
Provisional Application 62877994 · Jul 24, 2019
Related Publication 20240263551A1 · Aug 8, 2024
References Cited (69)
US 5573225A · Boyle · 1996 [cited by applicant]
US 7451819B2 · Chang · 2008 [cited by applicant]
US 7665535B2 · Van Wulfften Palthe · 2010 [cited by applicant]
US 8726983B2 · Khan · 2014 [cited by applicant]
US 8775347B2 · Goel · 2014 [cited by applicant]
US 9097084B2 · McDougall · 2015 [cited by applicant]
US 9109415B2 · Coles · 2015 [cited by applicant]
US 9617814B2 · Seals · 2017 [cited by applicant]
US 9657540B2 · Coles · 2017 [cited by applicant]
US 10309176B2 · Allmaras · 2019 [cited by applicant]
US 11371330B2 · Christie · 2022 [cited by applicant]
US 11946352B2 · Christie · 2024 [cited by examiner]
US 20020062156A1 · Yamakawa · 2002 [cited by applicant]
US 20040088115A1 · Guggari · 2004 [cited by applicant]
US 20050209836A1 · Klumpen · 2005 [cited by applicant]
US 20050209912A1 · Veeningen · 2005 [cited by applicant]
US 20080231467A1 · Jeffryes · 2008 [cited by applicant]
US 20080275594A1 · De Guzman · 2008 [cited by applicant]
US 20080281525A1 · Boone · 2008 [cited by applicant]
US 20080306803A1 · Vaal · 2008 [cited by applicant]
US 20090132458A1 · Edwards · 2009 [cited by applicant]
US 20090276156A1 · Kragas · 2009 [cited by applicant]
US 20120054246A1 · Fischer · 2012 [cited by applicant]
US 20130138254A1 · Seals · 2013 [cited by applicant]
US 20130231787A1 · Chapman · 2013 [cited by applicant]
US 20140208253A1 · Pettus · 2014 [cited by applicant]
US 20140214469A1 · Callow · 2014 [cited by applicant]
US 20140246238A1 · Abbassian · 2014 [cited by applicant]
US 20150167414A1 · Coles · 2015 [cited by applicant]
US 20150330172A1 · Allmaras · 2015 [cited by applicant]
US 20160115773A1 · Conrad · 2016 [cited by applicant]
US 20170030178A1 · Oehring · 2017 [cited by examiner]
US 20170241221A1 · Seshadri · 2017 [cited by applicant]
US 20170314353A1 · Viassolo · 2017 [cited by applicant]
US 20170370191A1 · Fox · 2017 [cited by applicant]
US 20180012310A1 · Fox · 2018 [cited by applicant]
US 20190316447A1 · Oehring · 2019 [cited by examiner]
US 20190354911A1 · Alaniz · 2019 [cited by examiner]
US 20200175444A1 · Fox · 2020 [cited by applicant]
US 20200224508A1 · Chapman · 2020 [cited by applicant]
US 20200270979A1 · Hradecky · 2020 [cited by applicant]
US 20210025267A1 · Christie · 2021 [cited by applicant]
WO 2019222033 · 2019 [cited by applicant]
Fox, M., and Long, D. 2003. PDDL2.1: An extension to PDDL for expressing temporal planning domains. J. Artif. Int. Res. 20(1):61{124. [cited by applicant]
Firby, Adaptive Execution in Complex Dynamic Worlds. Ph.D. Thesis, Yale University Department of Computer Science, 1989. [cited by applicant]
Simmons et al., “A Task Description Language for Robot Control”, Proceedings of the Conference on Intelligent Robotics and Systems, Vancouver, Canada, Oct. 1998, pp. 1931-1937. [cited by applicant]
Gat, E., “ESL: A Language for Supporting Robust Plan Execution in Embedded Autonomous Agents”, Proceedings of the AAAI Fall Symposium on Plan Execution, 1996, pp. 319-324. [cited by applicant]
Berry, G., The esterel v5 Language Primer, version 5.21 release 2.0, Centre de Mathematiques Appliquees, Ecole des Mines and INRIA, Apr. 6, 1999, 140 pgs. [cited by applicant]
Ingham et al., 2001: A Reactive Model-Based Programming Language for Robotic Space Explorers, Proceedings of ISAIRAS-01, 8 pages. [cited by applicant]
Nieuwenhuis, “SAT modulo theories: Enhancing SAT with special-purpose algorithms”, in Proc. 12th International Conference on Theory and Applications of Satisfiability Testing (SAT), p. 1, 2009. [cited by applicant]
Berry et al., “The ESTEREL synchronous programming language: design, semantics, implementation”, Science of Computer Programming, 19(2): 87-152, 1992. [cited by applicant]
Coles et al., “Forward-chaining partial-order planning”, In Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling, ICAPS 2010, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, May 12-16, 2010, pp. 42-49, 2010. [cited by applicant]
Williams et al., “Model-based Programming of Intelligent Embedded Systems and Robotic Space Explorers”, Proceedings of the IEEE, 91(1): 212-237, 2003. [cited by applicant]
Yoon et al., “FF-Replan: A Baseline for Probabilistic Planning”, in Proc. 17th International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS), 2007, 8 pages. [cited by applicant]
Henzinger, “The Theory of Hybrid Automata”, in Proceedings, 11th Annual IEEE Symposium on Logic in Computer Science, pp. 278-292, 1996. [cited by applicant]
Lamport, “Time, clocks, and the ordering of events in a distributed system”, Communications of the ACM, 21(7): 558-565, 1978. [cited by applicant]
Williams et al., “Model-based programming: Controlling embedded systems by reasoning about hidden state”, in Principles and Practice of Constrant Programming—CP 2002, 8th International Conference, CP 2002, Ithaca, NY, U… [cited by applicant]
Apt et al., “Towards a theory of declarative knowledge”, in Foundations of Deductive Databases and Logic Programming, pp. 89-148, 1988. [cited by applicant]
Bacchus et al., “Downward Refinement and the Efficiency of Hierarchical Problems-Solving”, Artificial Intelligence, vol. 71, pp. 43-100, 1994. [cited by applicant]
Bernardini et al., “Leveraging Probabilistic Reasoning in Deterministic Planning for Large-Scale Autonomous Search-and-Tracking”, in Proc. 26th International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS), pp. … [cited by applicant]
Bonasso et al., “Experiences with an Architecture for Intelligent Reactive Agent”, Journal of Experimental and Theoretical Artificial Intelligence (JETAI), 9, 1997, 24 pages. [cited by applicant]
Coddington et al., “Madbot: A motivated and goal directed robot”, in Proc. of National conference on AI (AAAI), vol. 20, pp. 1680, 2005. [cited by applicant]
Fox et al., “Exploration of the Robustness of Plans”, in Proc. 21st National Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), pp. 834-839, 2006. [cited by applicant]
Gat, “On Three-Layer Architecutes”, Artificial Intelligence and Mobile Robots, 195, 11 pages, 1998. [cited by applicant]
Gregory et la., “Planning Modulo Theories: Extending the Planning Paradigm”, in Proc. 22nd International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS), 2012, 9 pages. [cited by applicant]
Hoffmann et al., “The FF Planning Systems: Fast Plan Generation Through Heuristic Search”, J. Artif. Intell. Res. (JAIR), 14:253-302, 2001. [cited by applicant]
Howey et al., “VAL: automatic plan validation, continuous effects and mixed initiative planning using PDDL”, in Proc. 16th IEEE International Conference on Tools with Artificial Intelligence (ICTAI), pp. 294-301, 2004. [cited by applicant]
Koymans et al., “Specifying Real-Time Properties with Metric Temporal Logic”, Real-Time Systems, 2(4): 255-299, 1990. [cited by applicant]
McGann et la., “A Deliberative architecture for AUV Control”, in Proc. IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), pp. 1049-1054, 2008. [cited by applicant]
Cited By (1)
US 12,692,776