The company is the backbone of the oil and gas industry with singular focus on delivering the finest products and services on time and on budget. It has the technical expertise to create optimised production system designs

The oil and gas domain requires constant improvement of technologies in the exploration, development, and production sectors. In this era, shale gas has emerged as a key unconventional resource, which is very process intensive, with separation, treatment, and environmental monitoring requiring effective process control technologies and designs fit for the purpose.

"We understand that today’s solutions won’t be good enough for tomorrow. Our ability to integrate leading products delivers greater certainty, quality, and improved process technologies. We partner with exploration and production (E&P) companies to reduce the hydrocarbon lifecycle of production to configure comprehensive solutions that fit their needs. Whether it’s a single piece of quality equipment or an expertly designed system, you can count on us to deliver on time and on budget," says Rami Bakir, vice president Operations Middle East & North Africa, NOV Completion & Production Solutions.

NOV has substantial investments in over 14 locations in the UAE – from manufacturing and assembly to maintenance and certification facilities. NOV is present in over six locations throughout Saudi Arabia and in Oman the company has a manufacturing facility for its Fibre Glass Systems Business Unit. "Moreover, in every country in the Mena region we support our customers with a professional sales and technical force team and maintenance facilities," he says.

NOV is the backbone of the oil and gas industry with singular focus on delivering the finest products and services on time and on budget, where today’s catchphrase is "how to be part of the process of reducing the lifecycle of drilling and production to produce effectively while maintaining quality and safety." The company has the technical expertise to create optimised production system designs, he says.

In shale production, NOV’s excellent capabilities extend to the following categories:

Frac-Specialised Drilling Rigs and Intervention Equipment: NOV designs, upgrades, customises, and builds "fit for purpose" shale gas drilling rig units. The rigs being built have high mobility (fast rig up and down and moving), meet high pressure requirements, have a fast transition in between hole sections, and a movability design for the power and fluid packages. NOV is also adept at coiled tubing intervention systems design, specialising in customisable, high-capacity coiled tubing systems for specialised extended reach drilling (ERD). These optional truck-mounted units come with self-propelled tubing reels for permanent multi-pad work with 15K operating pressures and multiple mast configurations.

Drilling Automation in Unconventional Shales: NOV has the knowledge and know-how for optimising and reducing the number of drilling days by utilising their technology for wired drill pipe and selected specialised downhole unconventional shale gas bottomhole assembly (BHA) technologies. These, combined with the integration of equipment from NOV Rig Systems, obtain real time drilling optimisation such as continuous equivalent circulating density (ECD) readings, and rate of penetration (ROP) increase. This system also allows for decrease in the challenges we see with drilling downhole, not limited to stick slips, lateral, axial and torsional vibrations, in addition to a high resolution reservoir definition.

Frac-Enhanced Downhole Completion Systems: NOV technology offers completion deployment reduction for frac sleeves (including dissolvable balls and seats), zonal isolation options, such as the multistage fracturing completion systems (MFS), consisting of sleeves, either cemented or open hole with packers, increasing efficiency both in terms of time and cost, isolating the zone below – wherein the first and smallest ball operates the bottom/lowest zone and gradually larger balls are being pumped to operate the upper sleeves. This is all done in one continuous pumping sequence and NOV has run and operated more than 120 sleeves in one well. Using sleeves in completion allows for future open and closing of sleeves in case of high water production re-stimulation. The individual elements of the framework will be the provision of technologies needed to explore for shale gas.

Unconventional Modular Shale Gas Production (Skid Type) Systems: The technology and experience NOV has in unconventional gas for gas treatment and complete production systems range from designing and engineering hybrid gas treatment processing systems (gaseous contaminants – water, CO2, H2S) to the fabrication of fixed and modular skidding systems. These offerings include the design of specialised sand removal packages and management systems, process system design and analysis, CFD and FEA, flow analysis, valve and choke systems, produced water systems, and flare and advanced burner systems. NOV also provides corrosion-resistant fiberglass and spoolable flow lines for a longer piping system lifecycle.

Quick Pipeline Connectivity: NOV’s Zap-Lok system provides mechanical connection systems (4-5 times faster construction than the conventional pipeline systems), coupled with specialised Tuboscope internal plastic coatings (sour service optional) that provide an efficient and cost-effective pipeline installation, designed to maximise the design life of assets. Zap-Lok delivers a reliable and safe method to rapidly construct pipelines with up to 90 per cent reductions in manpower and infrastructure compared with that of conventional welding.

"Our capacity of modular customised EPF skidding designs for greenfields and satellite fields enables the customer to cut the time of setting a production facility by more than 50 percent of the fixed facilities, and capitalise on the mobility of the facility to other fields," he says.

This approach drives greater agility, enabling operators to adapt to business conditions quickly and cost effectively even connecting satellite fields to production, helping to ensure profitability in uncertain times. This is at a time when owner-operators and independent E&P companies require effective strategies to deal with increasing complexity and are calling for a more dynamic approach to shorten the investment lifecycle of the asset from the exploration to production, says Bakir.