Saskatchewan driller hits 'gusher' with ground-breaking geothermal well

[jungleboy]

https://financialpost.com/commodities/energy/saskatchewan-driller-hits-gusher-with-ground-breaking-geothermal-well-that-offers-hope-for-oil-workers


A first for Canada and the world, the well can produce enough electricity to power 3,000 homes

Author of the article:Geoffrey Morgan
Publishing date:Nov 27, 2020

CALGARY — A small, Saskatoon-based company has drilled and fracked the world’s first 90-degree horizontal well for geothermal power in a potentially landmark move that signals the arrival of a new energy source in Canada and provides fresh opportunities for oil and gas workers to apply their skills in renewable power.

No company in Canada has produced electricity from geothermal heat, but Deep Earth Energy Production Corp. chief executive officer Kirsten Marcia told the Financial Post that there’s a “big, big future for geothermal power in Western Canada,” as demonstrated by the results of the first ever horizontal geothermal well, which is also the deepest horizontal well ever drilled in Saskatchewan.

“We were looking for a way to explain to people that we drilled a gusher,” said Marcia, a geologist who worked in the mining and petroleum industries before pioneering a geothermal business in Saskatchewan. In the oil and gas world, a “gusher” is an extremely productive well that pumps substantial volumes of oil and gas.

In Canada’s nascent geothermal power industry, Deep’s “gusher” can produce steaming-hot water and brine with a temperature of 127 degrees centigrade at a rate of 100 litres per second. Marcia said those flow rates mean the well will actually be limited by the hardware, such as pump capacity, that are connected to the wellhead. She said the well, called the Border-5HZ well, is capable of producing 3 megawatts of renewable, reliable electricity, enough to power 3,000 homes.

The well will form part of a larger 20MW geothermal power project, which is expected to commence construction in 2023 in southern Saskatchewan close to the U.S. border.

The well is also a first for the global geothermal industry.


DEEP Earth’s Border-5HZ well in Saskatchewan is capable of producing 3 megawatts of renewable, reliable electricity, enough to power 3,000 homes.

Directional geothermal power wells have been drilled in California, but Marcia said those were drilled at a 75-degree angle, rather than being truly horizontal. Her company’s Border-5HZ well was drilled into the earth at a depth of 3,450 metres before turning at a 90 degree angle and drilling through sedimentary rock along a 2,000-metre lateral route.

“This is a sedimentary geothermal project. There aren’t a lot of them in the world,” Marcia said, noting that most geothermal power projects, including those in world-leading Iceland, drill vertically into volcanic rock formations. “In terms of drilling into a sedimentary basin, you’re drilling into sedimentary units that are like a stack of pancakes.”


Deep is also responsible for the deepest vertical well ever drilled in Saskatchewan, after announcing in Nov. 2018 it had drilled a 3,530-metre well.


Governments in Alberta and Saskatchewan have been revamping regulations for drilling and for power generation in an attempt to stimulate geothermal power investment in their provinces partly because the geothermal industry uses many of the same skills as the existing oil and gas industry.

This week, Alberta MLAs passed legislation that will allow the province’s energy regulator to develop a new framework for geothermal wells to be licensed and drilled in the province. The bill is considered a way to keep oilfield services workers, such as drillers, working as investment in renewable energy is projected to rise in the coming years.

Everything we’re doing is figuratively and literally on the backs of these highly skilled oilfield workers. We couldn’t do this without this expertise in this part of the world


While other geothermal wells have been drilled in Canada previously to channel heat directly from the earth, Deep and a handful of other companies are among the first in the country to use the earth’s heat to generate electricity.

In Alberta, Calgary-based oil and gas producer Razor Energy Corp. is working on a geothermal project north of Edmonton that would retrofit existing wells to produce 3MW to 5MW of geothermal power.

Near Fort Nelson, B.C., a natural gas-rich town, a non-profit research association called Geoscience BC is undertaking a feasibility study of the Clark Lake Geothermal project that would repurpose a gas field to produce geothermal power.


At Deep, Marcia said it’s very difficult to repurpose existing oil and gas wells to produce geothermal power because the diameters of most existing wells are too narrow for the tubing that geothermal wells need to pump water in a cycle through the earth’s crust.

However, geologists have identified multiple locations in Western Canada to produce geothermal power and use existing oil and gas skills in renewable power production, Marcia said.

Over 100 oilfield workers were on site to drill and hydraulic-fracture her company’s horizontal well in southern Saskatchewan in September and October, including a drilling crew from Houston-based Weatherford International Plc, and a pressure-pumping team from Saskatchewan’s Element Technical Services Inc.

“It’s amazing. Everything we’re doing is figuratively and literally on the backs of these highly skilled oilfield workers. We couldn’t do this without this expertise in this part of the world,” said Marcia.

She added that the project was de-risked in part by funding from the federal government, which committed $25.6 million in funding in January 2019 for the project. All told, the geothermal power project is expected to cost $51 million.

[Trochu]

I'm curious if in 50 years they'll have data that suggests geothermal wells are actually detrimental, the earth is cooling or some such. I wouldn't think so, due to the relatively negligible depths we're drilling, but curious none the less.

[comaderek]

Or they can just keep on drilling vertically until the hit the molten core and then they can create a volcano in Saskatchewan . That would be an impressive gusher!!

[KegRiver]

It sounds interesting, but I wonder about the word brine in the article.

Brine would mean salt water I suspect. In low concentrations probably not a big concern if dealt with properly. I expect the salt could be extracted and used like any other salt.

But if the concentrations are high it's presence could lead to all sorts of issues down the road.

As many know salt is highly corrosive in a moist environment and I expect it could lead to piping failures and damage to the environment.

There would also potentially be issues with stockpiling if the salt produced could not be marketed fast enough to keep ahead of production.

This could be a very good thing, but it could also have hidden costs.

[Dewey Cox]

It sounds too good.
I am skeptical.

[Map Maker]

Originally Posted by Dewey Cox

It sounds too good.
I am skeptical.

I hear ya.
But this project will generate 5 mW. And the one in Grande Prairie is the same size at 5mW.
First of its kind in Canada.
USA has geothermal plants generating 3450 mW.
It’s not new. Canada is just embarrassingly behind the eightball. Again.

[Jim Blake]

Sounds interesting! I wonder if it is viable without Government (Taxpayers) help? The project cost they say is 51 million. I wonder what time period the payout will take?

[Selkirk]

Very interesting, indeed ❗

And that FP article now includes some updates 👉 https://financialpost.com/commoditie...or-oil-workers

Selkirk

[ehrgeiz]

^
Alberta's legislation just passed on Tuesday. We're already seeing action in the sector. Like everything we'll out-doo Sask haha. Bigger, deeper, better.

Comments are right about the subsidy though. Still would gladly see more funding for this tech to see if it can become cost effective. I see subsidies for solar fields and wind farms as an absolute waste of investment and waste of land.

[jungleboy]

Originally Posted by ehrgeiz

^
Alberta's legislation just passed on Tuesday. We're already seeing action in the sector. Like everything we'll out-doo Sask haha. Bigger, deeper, better.

Comments are right about the subsidy though. Still would gladly see more funding for this tech to see if it can become cost effective. I see subsidies for solar fields and wind farms as an absolute waste of investment and waste of land.

Sounds like a title for a certain type of movie ...sorry couldn’t resist

[Albertacoyotecaller]

Originally Posted by KegRiver

It sounds interesting, but I wonder about the word brine in the article.

Brine would mean salt water I suspect. In low concentrations probably not a big concern if dealt with properly. I expect the salt could be extracted and used like any other salt.

But if the concentrations are high it's presence could lead to all sorts of issues down the road.

As many know salt is highly corrosive in a moist environment and I expect it could lead to piping failures and damage to the environment.

There would also potentially be issues with stockpiling if the salt produced could not be marketed fast enough to keep ahead of production.

This could be a very good thing, but it could also have hidden costs.

I am curious as well what they will do with the produced water afterwards. Could they source lithium from the salt water as well?

[Scott h]

Drilling wells to power Tesla's.......

[Scott h]

Originally Posted by Albertacoyotecaller

I am curious as well what they will do with the produced water afterwards. Could they source lithium from the salt water as well?

Now that you mention it....

https://www.powermag.com/mining-for-...ng-but-pricey/

[jstubbs]

Congrats to them. Nice to have some good news for once.

[KinAlberta]

Originally Posted by Scott h

Now that you mention it....

https://www.powermag.com/mining-for-...ng-but-pricey/

Recent article on BBC:


The new 'gold rush' for green lithium - BBC Future
By Catherine Early, 24th November 2020

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/2...e-green-energy

[Chewbacca]

Originally Posted by Albertacoyotecaller

I am curious as well what they will do with the produced water afterwards. Could they source lithium from the salt water as well?

Use a high powered pump and push it back down a different hole into the bore to get reheated? It’s just water.
Just spitballing.

[KegRiver]

Originally Posted by Scott h

Now that you mention it....

https://www.powermag.com/mining-for-...ng-but-pricey/

Well that makes it seem even more attractive.

I could see many benefits if this is done properly. I doubt all such wells would have Lithium but I expect there would be other valuable minerals in much of the wells.

So far I see nothing to fear and much to like about this idea.

[Jigsalot]

Originally Posted by jungleboy

https://financialpost.com/commodities/energy/saskatchewan-driller-hits-gusher-with-ground-breaking-geothermal-well-that-offers-hope-for-oil-workers


A first for Canada and the world, the well can produce enough electricity to power 3,000 homes

Author of the article:Geoffrey Morgan
Publishing date:Nov 27, 2020

CALGARY — A small, Saskatoon-based company has drilled and fracked the world’s first 90-degree horizontal well for geothermal power in a potentially landmark move that signals the arrival of a new energy source in Canada and provides fresh opportunities for oil and gas workers to apply their skills in renewable power.

No company in Canada has produced electricity from geothermal heat, but Deep Earth Energy Production Corp. chief executive officer Kirsten Marcia told the Financial Post that there’s a “big, big future for geothermal power in Western Canada,” as demonstrated by the results of the first ever horizontal geothermal well, which is also the deepest horizontal well ever drilled in Saskatchewan.

“We were looking for a way to explain to people that we drilled a gusher,” said Marcia, a geologist who worked in the mining and petroleum industries before pioneering a geothermal business in Saskatchewan. In the oil and gas world, a “gusher” is an extremely productive well that pumps substantial volumes of oil and gas.

In Canada’s nascent geothermal power industry, Deep’s “gusher” can produce steaming-hot water and brine with a temperature of 127 degrees centigrade at a rate of 100 litres per second. Marcia said those flow rates mean the well will actually be limited by the hardware, such as pump capacity, that are connected to the wellhead. She said the well, called the Border-5HZ well, is capable of producing 3 megawatts of renewable, reliable electricity, enough to power 3,000 homes.

The well will form part of a larger 20MW geothermal power project, which is expected to commence construction in 2023 in southern Saskatchewan close to the U.S. border.

The well is also a first for the global geothermal industry.


DEEP Earth’s Border-5HZ well in Saskatchewan is capable of producing 3 megawatts of renewable, reliable electricity, enough to power 3,000 homes.

Directional geothermal power wells have been drilled in California, but Marcia said those were drilled at a 75-degree angle, rather than being truly horizontal. Her company’s Border-5HZ well was drilled into the earth at a depth of 3,450 metres before turning at a 90 degree angle and drilling through sedimentary rock along a 2,000-metre lateral route.

“This is a sedimentary geothermal project. There aren’t a lot of them in the world,” Marcia said, noting that most geothermal power projects, including those in world-leading Iceland, drill vertically into volcanic rock formations. “In terms of drilling into a sedimentary basin, you’re drilling into sedimentary units that are like a stack of pancakes.”


Deep is also responsible for the deepest vertical well ever drilled in Saskatchewan, after announcing in Nov. 2018 it had drilled a 3,530-metre well.


Governments in Alberta and Saskatchewan have been revamping regulations for drilling and for power generation in an attempt to stimulate geothermal power investment in their provinces partly because the geothermal industry uses many of the same skills as the existing oil and gas industry.

This week, Alberta MLAs passed legislation that will allow the province’s energy regulator to develop a new framework for geothermal wells to be licensed and drilled in the province. The bill is considered a way to keep oilfield services workers, such as drillers, working as investment in renewable energy is projected to rise in the coming years.

Everything we’re doing is figuratively and literally on the backs of these highly skilled oilfield workers. We couldn’t do this without this expertise in this part of the world


While other geothermal wells have been drilled in Canada previously to channel heat directly from the earth, Deep and a handful of other companies are among the first in the country to use the earth’s heat to generate electricity.

In Alberta, Calgary-based oil and gas producer Razor Energy Corp. is working on a geothermal project north of Edmonton that would retrofit existing wells to produce 3MW to 5MW of geothermal power.

Near Fort Nelson, B.C., a natural gas-rich town, a non-profit research association called Geoscience BC is undertaking a feasibility study of the Clark Lake Geothermal project that would repurpose a gas field to produce geothermal power.


At Deep, Marcia said it’s very difficult to repurpose existing oil and gas wells to produce geothermal power because the diameters of most existing wells are too narrow for the tubing that geothermal wells need to pump water in a cycle through the earth’s crust.

However, geologists have identified multiple locations in Western Canada to produce geothermal power and use existing oil and gas skills in renewable power production, Marcia said.

Over 100 oilfield workers were on site to drill and hydraulic-fracture her company’s horizontal well in southern Saskatchewan in September and October, including a drilling crew from Houston-based Weatherford International Plc, and a pressure-pumping team from Saskatchewan’s Element Technical Services Inc.

“It’s amazing. Everything we’re doing is figuratively and literally on the backs of these highly skilled oilfield workers. We couldn’t do this without this expertise in this part of the world,” said Marcia.

She added that the project was de-risked in part by funding from the federal government, which committed $25.6 million in funding in January 2019 for the project. All told, the geothermal power project is expected to cost $51 million.

Bizzare. Mid morning I had an alert from one of those stock sites. Razor energy which is mentioned in this article. Well it went up 96 % today. Worth checking but not for me. Don’t do penny stuff

[Grizzly Adams]

Originally Posted by KegRiver

It sounds interesting, but I wonder about the word brine in the article.

Brine would mean salt water I suspect. In low concentrations probably not a big concern if dealt with properly. I expect the salt could be extracted and used like any other salt.

But if the concentrations are high it's presence could lead to all sorts of issues down the road.

As many know salt is highly corrosive in a moist environment and I expect it could lead to piping failures and damage to the environment.

There would also potentially be issues with stockpiling if the salt produced could not be marketed fast enough to keep ahead of production.

This could be a very good thing, but it could also have hidden costs.

All that "brine " down there is fossil water from an ancient sea. One has to wonder what else has been dissolved in there in there over time , besides salt and what is the disposal plan for the spent water ? Salt is not something we are short of . Then there is the possibility of radioactive elements in that water, given it's source.

Grizz

[Sundog57]

I think that you'll find that the "brine" is circulating fluid rather than produced brine - water with salts added to increase its thermal load capacity and modify its boiling point.
Because the temperature of the produced fluid is not high enough to drive a (water) steam turbine, a heat exchanger is used to transfer produced heat into a butane carrier which then drives a turbine (the butane is vapourised and recondensed not burned)

[DiabeticKripple]

sounds like the water will be "recycled" as in produced, used to generate power, then reinjected back down to be heated again.

[coyotecaller]

Yes that’s how geothermal works. It’s pumped from deep, used in a heat exchanger and then reinjected back. Closed loop system.

[Rvsask]

Originally Posted by Map Maker

I hear ya.
But this project will generate 5 mW. And the one in Grande Prairie is the same size at 5mW.
First of its kind in Canada.
USA has geothermal plants generating 3450 mW.
It’s not new. Canada is just embarrassingly behind the eightball. Again.

Yes we are. Iceland makes about 30% of its electricity this way and have been for decades. I’m not sure what it is that could be to good to be true. It’s good, true and has been for a long time.

[Chewbacca]

Originally Posted by coyotecaller

Yes that’s how geothermal works. It’s pumped from deep, used in a heat exchanger and then reinjected back. Closed loop system.

Somehow missed that point in the article when I suggested it.

[Grizzly Adams]

Originally Posted by Rvsask

Yes we are. Iceland makes about 30% of its electricity this way and have been for decades. I’m not sure what it is that could be to good to be true. It’s good, true and has been for a long time.

Iceland sits on the Mid Atlantic ridge. they can bake bread by burying it in the ground.

Grizz

[6.5 shooter]

Originally Posted by coyotecaller

Yes that’s how geothermal works. It’s pumped from deep, used in a heat exchanger and then reinjected back. Closed loop system.

That is how it works and millions of oil/gas wells produce "brine" water ever day in Alberta/Sask and it is re-injected down hole where it came from.

As for Radiation that to is dealt with daily in the oil and gas industry as well and is naturally occurring in the environment every day.. nothing new.

[Okotok]

Sounds encouraging. Rough costs for fossil fuel power is ~1mm per megawatt for construction. This initial well will generate 3 MW at a cost of $51mm. Things will likely get cheaper at some point particularly in operating costs. Alberta also doesn't have a lot of sufficiently "hot" spots in areas of need like Fort McMurray. Not that existing infrastructure or new couldn't be used/built for transmission.

My understanding also is that the wells only generate sufficient heat for a couple of years or so and that the heat around that zone dissipates which means new wells need to be drilled every few years and the original ones allowed to regenerate. Just a bit of info I gleaned while working on an unrelated use for geothermal. I could be in left field somewhat as it's been quite a while since we were investigating geothermal for some oil and gas related purposes.

[blgoodbrand1]

Originally Posted by Scott h

Drilling wells to power Tesla's.......

Hey...wait a minute


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Map Maker]

Originally Posted by Jim Blake

Sounds interesting! I wonder if it is viable without Government (Taxpayers) help? The project cost they say is 51 million. I wonder what time period the payout will take?

Yes it would be good to hear the numbers of how long to payback the investment.
I think there is just too much risk for a private entity to do this with government support.
Government backs a project like this and makes sure it’s done right. Then when it’s done and profitable, government sells it for its money back and modest return.
In a perfect world. Lol.

[Iron Brew]

Originally Posted by Okotok

Sounds encouraging. Rough costs for fossil fuel power is ~1mm per megawatt for construction. This initial well will generate 3 MW at a cost of $51mm. Things will likely get cheaper at some point particularly in operating costs. Alberta also doesn't have a lot of sufficiently "hot" spots in areas of need like Fort McMurray. Not that existing infrastructure or new couldn't be used/built for transmission.

My understanding also is that the wells only generate sufficient heat for a couple of years or so and that the heat around that zone dissipates which means new wells need to be drilled every few years and the original ones allowed to regenerate. Just a bit of info I gleaned while working on an unrelated use for geothermal. I could be in left field somewhat as it's been quite a while since we were investigating geothermal for some oil and gas related purposes.

Years ago I was reading an article on this. There is apparently quite a bit of information about managing these thermal zones. Yes, you can "kill" it by over drawing the heat, but the science is out there about how to avoid that. No, I don't have access (or interest). I'm getting to the end of my career and having had 4 major swaps, not really interested in going back for another.

I'm going to guess Iceland or somebody similar has an educational facility that would allow people to specialize in that kind of management.