Oil based mud (OBM)  filtercake treatment

Arcasolve ORCA ^TM for OBM filter cake removal

Drilling with oil-based muds (OBMs) or drill-in fluids (DIFs) can also damage the near wellbore region and impair well productivity but offer different technical challenges to clean-up compared with treating filter cakes arising from drilling with water-based muds (WBMs) or DIFs.

OBM filter cakes are typically comprised of a water in oil emulsion and often contain weighting agents and drill cuttings fines e.g. calcium carbonate and barite.  In some cases they may also contain polymers.  With the increasing use of openhole horizontal/directional completions, drawdown alone cannot be relied on to cleanup filtercake along the whole of the wellbore.  Effective removal of this mud filter cake is vital to optimise well performance and NPV.

Arcasolve ORCA ^TM is very effective for the clean up of damage caused by oil based muds or drill-in fluids, including carbonate-containing OBMs. The photographs below show the effect of Arcasolve ORCA ^TM on a filter cake produced using a commercial oil based mud formulation containing calcium carbonate. 

The water wetting and oil solubilising components of the Arcasolve ORCA^TM formulation disperse the hydrocarbon component and together with the optional in-situ acidizing also dissolve the carbonate in the filter cake.  This allows a complete treatment of filter cake in a single stage process. 

If you have specific candidate wells for OBM MUD DAMAGE REMOVAL TREATMENTS you can send us details by completing the submission form on this web site.  This will allow us to identify the specific Arcasolve^TM formulation and treatment fluid volume required before we reply to you.