Systems and methods for drilling geothermal wells

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-12018564-B2
Application number	US-202217823485-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Aug 30, 2022
Priority date	Aug 31, 2021
Publication date	Jun 25, 2024
Grant date	Jun 25, 2024

Abstract

Systems and methods for drilling a geothermal well can include drilling a vertical borehole to a target location, drilling a plurality of lateral boreholes, each of which is connected to the vertical borehole, and can include generating a plurality of chambers in at least one of the plurality of lateral boreholes. The techniques can include drilling a plurality of passageways that each provide fluid communication between one of the plurality of chambers in a first lateral borehole and a second lateral borehole of the plurality of lateral boreholes. The techniques can form a fluid circuit for injecting a heating fluid such as water or brine and recovering hot water and steam using a single vertical borehole. The hot water and/or steam can be used to generate electrical power with a geothermal power facility.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method comprising:
drilling a vertical borehole to a target location;
using at least a portion of the vertical borehole, drilling a plurality of lateral boreholes, each of which is connected to the vertical borehole;
generating a plurality of chambers in at least a first lateral borehole of the plurality of lateral boreholes, each chamber of the plurality of chambers having an interior dimension larger than a diameter of the first lateral borehole; and
drilling a plurality of passageways that each provide fluid communication between one of the plurality of chambers in the first lateral borehole and a second lateral borehole of the plurality of lateral boreholes.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
drilling a first gauge hole in the vertical borehole at a first location of a first parallel lateral well;
casing a curve in the first gauge hole at the first location;
milling the casing in the curve for a second gauge hole; and
providing a pipe in the second gauge hole to form an annulus between an inside of the first gauge hole and an outside of the pipe.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein hot water or steam flows up the annulus.

4. The method of claim 2 , further comprising:
reinforcing the vertical borehole and the first lateral borehole well beyond the curve.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the target location is a geothermally active location within the earth.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein one of the first lateral borehole and the second lateral borehole is located above the other.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the generating of the plurality of chambers comprises at least one or more of targeted jetting, applying acid slugs, washing out, and drilling with asymmetric drill bits.

8. The method of claim 7 , wherein the generating of the plurality of chambers comprises forming the plurality of chambers having at least a predetermined diameter or shape.

9. A controller device, comprising:
a memory comprising computer-executable instructions; and
one or more processors in communication with the memory and configured to access the memory and execute the computer-executable instructions to perform the method of claim 1 .

10. One or more non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising computer-executable instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform the method of claim 1 .

11. A method for drilling a geothermal well, the method comprising:
drilling a vertical borehole towards a geothermal heat source;
using at least a portion of the vertical borehole, drilling a first lateral borehole and a second lateral borehole, each of the first lateral borehole and the second lateral borehole extending from the vertical borehole;
creating a plurality of chambers in at least the first lateral borehole or the second lateral borehole, each chamber of the plurality of chambers having an interior dimension larger than a diameter of the first lateral borehole or the second lateral borehole; and
drilling a plurality of passageways that each provide fluid communication between the first lateral borehole and the second lateral borehole.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein each passageway extends from at least one chamber of the plurality of chambers.

13. The method of claim 11 , further comprising forming an annulus in at least a portion of the vertical borehole, wherein the annulus is adapted to provide a heated fluid from at least one of the first lateral borehole and the second lateral borehole.

14. The method of claim 11 , wherein one of the first lateral borehole and the second lateral borehole is located above the other.

15. The method of claim 11 , wherein at least one passageway of the plurality of passageways extends from one of the first lateral borehole or the second lateral borehole at an angle of between 10 degrees and 85 degrees.

16. The method of claim 11 , wherein at least one passageway of the plurality of passageways extends from one of the first lateral borehole or the second lateral borehole at an angle of 90 degrees.

17. The method of claim 11 , wherein at least one passageway of the plurality of passageways extends from one of the first lateral borehole or the second lateral borehole at a first angle and at least a second passageway of the plurality of passageways extends from one of the first lateral borehole or the second lateral borehole at a second angle, wherein the first angle and the second angle are different.

18. The method of claim 11 , further comprising a third lateral borehole extending from the vertical borehole, wherein the third lateral borehole is located between the first lateral borehole and the second lateral borehole.

19. The method of claim 18 , wherein a first plurality of passageways extend from the first lateral borehole to the third lateral borehole and a second plurality of passageways extend from the second lateral borehole to the third lateral borehole.

Assignees

• Helmerich & Payne Tech Llc

Inventors

• Benson Todd W
• Jamieson Angus Lamberton

Classifications

• E21B29/002

  Cutting, e.g. milling, a pipe with a cutter rotating along the circumference of the pipe · CPC title

• E21B7/18

  Drilling by liquid or gas jets, with or without entrained pellets (E21B7/14 takes precedence) · CPC title

• E21B44/00

  Automatic control systems specially adapted for drilling operations, i.e. self-operating systems which function to carry out or modify a drilling operation without intervention of a human operator, e.g. computer-controlled drilling systems; Systems specially adapted for monitoring a plurality of drilling variables or conditions · CPC title

• F03G4/00

  Devices for producing mechanical power from geothermal energy · CPC title

• F24T10/17

  using tubes closed at one end, i.e. return-type tubes · CPC title