Rig 26 will be able drill up to 37,000 feet (11,278 metres), or more than 7 miles (11 kilometres), from its pad when it goes to work in a few months. Current
The company will be able to reach pockets of oil that previously would have required substantial new infrastructure.
“In a nutshell, it’s more powerful. In terms of just the amount of pump power that it has and hoisting capacity that it has — just much more powerful than the other rigs and that’s what allows us to drill much longer depths of wells,” said
Rig 26 weighs about 9.5 million pounds (4.31 million kilograms) and has four mud pumps that are each rated to 2,200 horsepower. Pumps that size typically are reserved for large offshore drilling rigs, McGrath said.
The rig can burn a mix of processed field gas and diesel.
“It’s got the potential to displace about 50% of the diesel required to operate the rig, which will be a big savings for us in terms of emissions as well as cost throughout the program,” McGrath said.
The rig's ability potential to reduce surface facilities spurred its development.
Committing to the new drilling rig gave
The rig is about 90% assembled at Doyon’s facilities in Deadhorse, said
McGrath characterized the many rig modules as going together “like a big
Building and moving the rig to the
Doyon spokeswoman
About 65 Doyon employees will work on Rig 26 when it's deployed. Additional help will be needed for work camps, truck driving and other support, McGrath said..
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