Prolific deepwater frontiers hold a wealth of opportunity for oil and gas recovery. But as E&P companies ramp up drilling activity in these promising fields, they are encountering challenges that drive up costs, non-productive time, and risk. Inherently unstable wellbores prone to pore-pressure changes and the possibility of the well to pack-off in often remote reservoirs are among the issues. West Africa is an important deepwater market where high drilling costs are ushering in advanced methods, such as managed pressure drilling (MPD), that are changing the way wells are drilled. MPD, the technique of maintaining and controlling bottomhole pressure using surface equipment, has been a game-changer in the industry's ability to access deepwater and ultra-deepwater reservoirs. These environments typically present narrow drilling windows, caused by the combined pressure of the water and sediment.
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