Journal of the Korean Society of Mineral and Energy Resources Engineers ISSN:2288-0291(Print) 2288-2790(Online) 한국자원공학회지

A kick is defined as an unscheduled flow of formation fluids into a wellbore. Well control includes not only kick prevention and kick detection, but also the process of removing kick fluids safely from the kicking well. A loss of control of kick, often followed by a blowout, causes high drilling cost, pollution, and governmental regulations. Therefore, well control is one of the most important operations for whole petroleum development stages. In this study, the Choe and Juvkam-Wold well control model, which is proven to be accurate and stable, was selected from literature review and a well control simulator was developed with hardware interface. The model uses an input of surface choke open area from the hardware and displays surface choke and pump pressures in two 7-segement display units after computer simulation. The model is good for realistic well control practices and education, and a user can learn the difference between theoretical and actual well controls. From several runs using the simulator, training and education of well control based on sound understanding on well control is proved to be one of the most important factors for safe and effective well control.