what does a workover rig do made in china

Their exceptional mobility, stability, and ease of operation are the outcome of our extensive experience in the design and production of mobile drilling rigs.

Belonging to the same family, Sovonex™ service rigs comprise many of the technological advantages that result in smooth operation and make the life of our customers’ easier:

Wide selection: At our production facility in China we design and develop workover rigs for service depths ranging from 1,600 m to 8,500 m (5,250 ft-27,900 ft), and workover depths from 2,000 m to 9,000 m (6,600 ft-30,000 ft) for 2 7/8” DP.

Full API coverage: The different components of our well-servicing rigs are manufactured to the following API standards:Steel structures, such as the mast: API Spec 4F

Highly maneuverable : Sovonex™ mobile drilling rigs and self-propelled workover rigs possess excellent driving properties in the desert, mountain, and other impassable terrains.

Powerful CAT engines and a custom-made chassis that can be equipped with single wheel full suspension enable well service operations in even the most remote areas.

Suited for corrosive environments: All steel parts are specially protected against corrosion through the application of multiple layers of ship paint. The same coating process is used in marine shipbuilding.

Reduced NPT: The mast is erected hydraulically to reduce time for rig up and increase safety. Likewise, all rig components have been designed to allow for fast assembly and disassembly.

With every service rig, we send technical staff to our customer to provide first-hand technical support. The engineer responsible for the rig design is always part of the service crew.

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The automatic operation equipment for minor workover is mainly composed of a wellhead operation device, hydraulic elevator, pipe and rod transmission and arrangement device and electro-hydraulic control system.

Each part of the device has different structural forms and can be selected arbitrarily for personalized configuration according to the needs of users.

The device adopts the structural form of dispersing the functional modules and integrated installation on the workover rig: with the hydraulic tong, manipulator and anti splash snap device set on the derrick of the workover rig, which can expand and rotate, and the safety slip is installed above the BOP.

The device only needs to install safety slips, which realizes rapid installation and migration and shortens the auxiliary working time. The device has the function of moving back and forth, left and right, which is convenient to align the wellhead. The height of the hydraulic tong is adjustable and can adapt to the wellhead with different heights. Hoisting equipment and special transport vehicles are not required for the installation and removal of the device.

In addition to its main function of suspending the pipe string, it also has the functions of automatic tubing mouth match, make-up and break-out, and is also equipped with a guide device bearing reverse torque, which can realize the functions of automatic well washing, sand flushing, drilling, grinding and milling.

Main function: connect to the wellhead flange and clamp the pipe string. Slip teeth are common with other manufacturers for easy replacement. The hydraulic cylinder is clamped and the pipe string is forced to be centered. The clamping is reliable and convenient for automatic operation. Open and close state detection, and realize safety interlock with other equipment.

The main electric control box can be installed on the operation vehicle or integrated into the modular wellhead operation device. The make-up torque of various oil pipes is set on the touch screen to realize automatic make-up and break-down. Equipped with video monitoring, process prompt, safety alarm, etc. The control system has a perfect action interlocking function to ensure the safety and reliability of the workover operation process. All of the electric cabinets, sensors, connectors meet the requirement of Explosion-proof on field.

The hydraulic system includes hydraulic source, wellhead automatic operation device control valve group, hydraulic elevator, hydraulic slip valve group, conveyor control valve group and pipeline, etc.

Sanjack has been committed to the research of automatic workover technology for many years and has a perfect automatic workover technology development, production, and manufacturing system.

In recent years, a whole set of automation technology has been formed in the automation and intelligent development of automatic workover equipment. Through the application of module design, servo drive, integrated control, electro-hydraulic compound drive and other technologies, the supporting products suitable for various types of workover equipment have been developed to meet the needs of oilfield workover equipment upgrading.

Second floor platform automatic pipe arranging manipulator replace the derrick worker on the second-story platform, it is to use fully automatic grabbing/arrange pipe string erection operations, realizing unattended operation on the second-story platform.

Drill floor automatic pipe arranging manipulator can replace workers to complete the placement of the column on the drill floor surface, and connect single joint, thread connection, etc., to achieve unmanned operation of the drill floor for major workover operations.

Two kinds of automatic make-up and break-down equipment with different structural forms and different characteristics replace the manual push-pull operation of hydraulic tong.

The tong body floats and hangs, and the tong mouth automatically aligns the center of the pipe string, which can be clamped reliably without damaging the surface of the pipe body.

The original integrated structure of hydraulic tong and punching tong can meet the thread up and down of tubing/drill pipe at the same time. The tong head has a floating function, which can automatically compensate the center deviation between the pipe string and the jaw and reduce the damage when the tong teeth clamp the pipe body. The torque can be accurately controlled and set, and the make-up torque of pipe string meets the requirements of API. When in standby, it can rotate and give way as a whole to provide more active operation space for the drill floor. The tong head can be deflected to meet the make-up & break-down of the mouse hole string.

Instead of the traditional mechanical elevator, the hydraulic drive valve is opened and closed, and the elevator is deflected and overturned, so there is no need to lift the elevator manually.

Main function: replace the field worker to lift the pipe string and realize the automatic transportation of the pipe string from the ground to the drill floor.

The installation centering and positioning mechanism is designed to realize the accurate positioning of the equipment at one time and shorten the installation time.

The push pulley is designed to realize the traveling sliding between the pulley and the pipe string and effectively protect the screw thread of the pipe string.

It adopts programmable integrated control and industrial network communication to realize centralized control, process management and status monitoring of all automation equipment.

The hydraulic station provides hydraulic power for automatic loading and unloading hydraulic clamps, hydraulic elevators, pipe string conveyors, drill floor manipulators and other equipment.

Shandong Beyond Petroleum Equipment Co., Ltd, hereinafter referred to as "Beyond", was established in year 2016 and certified by ISO9001. Its main business scope is to supply drilling equipment and spares for overseas customers from different sectors, like petroleum, water well, construction and HDD.

Beyond products cover but not limited to: oil drilling & workover rig, water well drilling rig, pile drilling rig, horizontal directional drilling rig, mud pump and spares, solid control system & equipment, and other different drilling materials. Dedicated to strict quality control and thoughtful customer service, our experienced staff members are always available to discuss your requirements and ensure full customer satisfaction. We can customize the product supply as per your on-site conditions, and we can offer overseas after-sale services with our strong technical support. Thanks to our professional services, quality products, fast delivery and competitive prices, we have built up a very good reputation among our customers. Our products had covered countries like USA, Venezuela, Argentina, India, Singapore, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Egypt and Ethiopia.

With "Professional & Efficient, Customer Focus, Win-win Cooperation" as its business principle, Beyond believes we will become your trustable and reliable partner in China. We warmly welcome you to be our customers to establish good cooperation and create a bright future with us together. Choose Beyond, You will get beyond your expectations and we will not let you down.

The grid electricity workover rig can meet all kinds of workover operational requirements due to its safety, stability, and reliability as well as excellent technical performances. The wellsite is now completely free from exhausted gas/oil emissions, and well site noise has also been greatly reduced. We can make a new contribution to save energy in oilfields by using this kind of environmentally-friendly workover rig.

Our company founded in the Yellow River delta (Shengli Oil Field, the second large oil field in China)--- Dongying City, Shandong Province. It engages into the designing, developing, testing, manufacturing, repairing, and drilling service. Its business covers drilling rig, workover rig, solids control equipment, drilling rig supporting and drilling strings and other equipments related with petroleum.

As a China top oil drilling rig solids control system manufacturer: GN Solids Control now list the top 10 oil drilling rig manufacturers for your reference.

equipment in China, is the earliest established, largest and most powerful oil drilling rig and production equipment developer and manufacturer under CNPC, the largest research and production base of land rigs and series mud pumps in the world, and also the largest and most powerful base for R&D and production of wire ropes for special purposes in China.

Lanzhou LS-National Oilwell Petroleum Engineering Co. Ltd. (LS-NOW for short) is a Sino-American Joint Venture established between Lanzhou Petrochemical Machinery Equipment and Engineering Group Corporation (LS Group) and National Oilwell International, Inc. (NOI). Scope of business: design, develop and manufacture complete land and offshore drilling rigs and workover rigs, and provide equipment package, components, fittings, parts and full services.

Main products: serial drilling rigs that are electrical or mechanical or electrical-mechanical compounded driven and suitable for different applications such as land, shallow, offshore and desert and meet the requirements of drilling and workover services. The drilling depth ranged from 1000 to 9000 meters.

Sichuan Honghua Petroleum Equipment Co., Ltd., established in 1997, is a subsidiary of Honghua Group which has been listed successfully in the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong. The company has been engaged in research, design, manufacturing and general assembly of oil drilling rig and equipments for oil exploration and development. Now it is the world’s second land drilling rig manufacturer, and China ‘s largest exporter of drilling rigs.

The company owns five subsidiaries totally in home and abroad, with 3600 employees. Company headquarter is located in Deyang City, Sichuan, a heavy-duty equipment base in China, which covers an area of about 1,000 mus, and with more than 2,200 employees, annual output of 150 drilling rigs and 600 mud pumps etc. Its production capacity is up to 8 billion RMB production scale.

The company produces mainly various land drilling rigs for drilling 1000m to 9000m wells and offshore drilling modules– DC drive drilling rig, AC VF electric rig, mechanical drilling rig, composite drive rig, trailer mounted rig and independent RT electric drive drilling rig, as well as their matched equipments, i.e. drilling pumps, traveling block system, solid control system, electric control system etc.

RG PETRO-MACHINERY (GROUP) CO. LTD is one of the largest manufacturers for petroleum drilling rig equipment in China. It is a stock company, reorganized from Nanyang petroleum machinery plant (former No.2 Petroleum Machinery Manufacturing Plant of National Petroleum Industrial Ministry of China). As a former national technical equipment production base, authorized by former national economic and commercial committee of China, RG PETRO-MACHINERY (GROUP) CO. LTD has become a company for national new product trial production of China, light-duty drilling rigs production base of SINOPEC and a high-tech enterprise in Henan Province.

RG PETRO-MACHINERY (GROUP) CO. LTD, with its technical center, information center and quality inspection center at provincial level, has possessed 16 production plants for forging, metal machining, heat treatment, steel-structure manufacturing, general assembly, painting and new product trial production, and 3 comprehensive testing sites for drilling rigs as well as 2 Sino-American joint ventures and 2 share-holding joint ventures.

SJ Petroleum Machinery Co. , one of petroleum drilling  rig and production equipment backbone manufacturers and Manufacturing Base for National Key Equipment (Workover, Cementing and Fracturing Equipment) recognized by National Economy and Trade Commission, has provided lots of advanced equipment to domestic customers in lieu of expensive imported equipment, and played an important role in increasing profits of petroleum industry and decreasing domestic oilfield development cost.

Our company Shandong Kerui Holding Group is located in Shengli Oilfield the second largest oilfield in China. Our company arranges a wide range of businesses covering the scientific research and manufacture of the petroleum drilling equipment and oilfield engineering technical service. The main products manufactured and supplied include drilling equipment, Oil pumping equipment, Special equipment for oilfield, Oilfield tubing system and auxiliary machines and tools. We can manufacture various workover rigs and drilling rigs with drill depth from 3000m to 9000m. All products meet API standard. Our company has been granted API Certificate, ISO 9001: 2000 Quality System Certificate, HSE Certificate, and also got International Petroleum Engineering Management qualification certificate issued by the Ministry of Commerce of China.

The main products manufactured and supplied include oil drilling rig equipment, Oil pumping equipment, Special equipment for oilfield, Oilfield tubing system and auxiliary machines and tools. We can manufacture various workover rigs and drilling rigs with drill depth from 3000m to 9000m. All products meet API standard. Our company has been granted API Certificate, ISO 9001: 2000 Quality System Certificate, HSE Certificate, and also got International Petroleum Engineering Management qualification certificate issued by the Ministry of Commerce of China

(shanghai) petroleum equipment co., ltd. is established on august 2001. the 3h is the first rig manufacturer that introduces ship-building technology to the fabrication of petroleum equipment.

Shengli Oilfield Highland Petroleum Equipment Co., Ltd Established in 1992 was a private incorporated manufacturer of petroleum equipments located in Dongying city, Shandong province, the PRC. Through many years development, the company had been recognized and become well-known in petroleum industry achieved the superior position in the field of scale, product quality, technology ensuring and selling service and so on in petroleum equipment manufacturing in China. It possesses 3.5 billion RMB of total assets, owns more than 1,980 thousand square meters of plant area, China’s state-approved high-tech enterprise, China’s patent star enterprise, Shandong Province top 100 and excellent enterprise, Shandong Province unique petroleum equipment R & D center and over 370 engineers and technicians and 150 contracted noted specialists in ceeusro field.

Drilling Rig: Highland Company Drilling Rig Plant has advanced key facilities and assembly workshops for manufacturing rigs and it has enough test sites for assembling 12 sets of large scale drilling rigs at the same time，5 series (ZJ20~ZJ70, including 18 types) of drilling rigs have been developed and manufactured. These developed and manufactured products consist of mechanical drive, DC driven, AC VF drive and Electromechnical drilling rigs, which can handle the well with depth of 1500- 7000m in most of the large oilfields both at home and overseas.

The land drilling market worldwide is structured primarily as a rental market, not a sales market, where land drilling companies lease their rigs to E&P companies for an agreed period of time – weeks, months, or years – at a day-rate. The rigs are then used to drill wells and execute the E&P’s drilling programs.

Drilling opportunities are analysed and explored in order, leaving a series of dry holes, until a discovery is made. It is rare for an E&P company to actually own the rigs which they operate, but there are some exceptions such as Chesapeake, who will purchase their own fleet of rigs.

Under these rental contracts, a turnkey cost is paid by an E&P business to a middleman. This includes an insurance premium, which is returned if nothing goes wrong, but may be lost if there are difficulties. Higher specification equipment commands a larger premium.

Investors require a minimum level of return for their investment dollars in drilling operations, and typically equate cost with risk. These turnkey drilling contracts may limit risk by guaranteeing a minimum number of wells that can be drilled with the rig. The contract will also outline how the rig can be used – including the pieces of equipment, when to change pieces, temperature and pressure tolerances and the weight of mud.

The International Association of Drilling Contractors (IADC) lists 547 members in the category of Land Drilling Contractors. According to Statista, the key US land drilling contractors are: Nabors Industries Ltd, Helmerich & Payne Inc, Patterson-UTI Energy Inc, Precision Drilling Corporation and Pioneer Energy Services Corp.

Nabors operates the world’s largest land drilling rig fleet, with around 500 rigs operating in over 25 countries – in almost every significant O&G basin on the planet. It also has the largest number of high-specification rigs (including new AC rigs and refurbished SCR rigs) and custom rigs, built to withstand challenging conditions such as extreme cold, desert and many complex shale plays.

Headquartered in Tulsa, Oklahoma, H&P is a global business with land operations across the US, as well as offshore operations in the Gulf of Mexico. It is engaged primarily in the drilling of O&G wells for E&P companies, and recognised for its innovative FlexRig technology.

Patterson-UTI operates land based drilling rigs, primarily in O&G producing regions of the continental US, and western Canada. The company also provides pressure pumping services to US E&P companies and specialist technology, notably pipe handling components, to drilling contractors globally.

Precision is an oilfield services company and Canada’s largest drilling rig contractor, with over 240 rigs in operation worldwide. The Company has two segments. The Contract Drilling Services segment operates its rigs in Canada, the United States and internationally. The Completion and Production Services segment provides completion and workover services and ancillary services to O&G E&P companies in Canada and the US.

Pioneer operates a modern fleet of more than 24 top performing drilling rigs throughout onshore O&G producing regions of the US and Colombia. The company also offers production services include well servicing, wireline, and coiled tubing services – supported by 100 well-servicing rigs, and more than 100 cased-hole, open-hole and offshore wireline units.

Together these five companies dominate the US rental market. Other smaller but prominent contractors include: Parker Drilling, Unit Corp, Independence Contract Drilling, Seventy Seven Energy, Schramm and Ensign Drilling. Beyond these players, the market is highly fractured, with many “mom & pop” style drillers.

In Texas, generally considered to be the centre of US land drilling, RigData reports that there are currently 678 active rigs – split between Helmerich & Payne (160), Patterson-UTI (85), Nabors (64), Precision Drilling (39) and 77 other drillers (330).

Most new onshore rigs, both drilling and work over rigs, are built by OEMs in China. In the US, the larger vertically integrated land drillers have in-house manufacturing operations, so they will outsource some equipment construction, but assemble the new rigs at their own facilities. The leading provider of US newbuild rigs is National Oilwell Varco.

The secondary market, where existing rigs are sold, is largely auction dominated with mostly older rigs changing hands. As a rule, the big land drillers do not sell their newbuild rigs, as each has their own flagship designs.

Tensions between China and Vietnam over the disputed South China Sea are at their highest levels in years. On May 2, the state-owned China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) placed its deep sea drilling rig HD-981 in disputed waters south of the Paracel Islands. Vietnam objected to the placement, declaring that the rig is located on its continental shelf. China has since sent approximately 80 ships, including seven military vessels, along with aircraft to support the rig. In response, Hanoi dispatched 29 ships to attempt to disrupt the rig’s placement and operations.

The situation escalated dramatically on May 7, when Vietnam accused Chinese vessels of turning high powered water cannons on the Vietnamese ships and eventually ramming several vessels. The incidents reportedly left six Vietnamese injured and several of the country’s ships damaged. Hanoi released photos and videos of the incidents to support its claims.

The implications of these developments are significant. The fact that the Chinese moved ahead in placing their rig immediately after President Obama’s visit to four Asian countries in late April underlines Beijing’s commitment to test the resolve of Vietnam, its ASEAN neighbors and Washington. Beijing may also be attempting to substantially change the facts on the seas by moving while it perceives Washington to be distracted by Russian aggression inUkraine, developments in Nigeria, and Syria. If China believes Washington is distracted, in an increasingly insular and isolationist mood and unwilling to back up relatively strong security assertions made to Japan and the Philippines and repeated during President Obama’s trip, these developments south of the Paracel Islands could have long term regional and global consequences.

A1:The war of words between Beijing and Hanoi has largely focused on the status of the area where HD-981 was placed. Vietnamese officials insist that it lies on their continental shelf, where according to the UN Convention on the Law of the Seas (UNCLOS), Vietnam has exclusive rights to all mineral and hydrocarbon resources.

The rig was placed near the edge of two hydrocarbon blocks already created by Hanoi, though not yet offered for exploitation to foreign oil and gas companies. It also sits near blocks 118 and 119, where U.S.-based ExxonMobil discovered substantial oil and gas reserves in 2011 and 2012. In 2013, Exxon and Vietnam’s state-owned PetroVietnam announced plans to build a $20 billion power plant to be fueled by the oil and gas from those blocks. Those discoveries help explain why CNOOC chose to place HD-981 nearby.

China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has responded to Vietnam’s complaints by insisting that the rig was placed “completely within the waters of China"s Paracel Islands.” This presumably refers to the 200 nautical mile exclusive economic zone and continental shelf that those islands—which are occupied by China but claimed by Vietnam—would generate under UNCLOS if they met certain requirements.

HD-981 was placed at 15°29’58’’ north latitude and 111°12’06’’ east longitude. It is about 120 nautical miles east of Vietnam’s Ly Son Island and 180 nautical miles south of China’s Hainan Island—the two nearest features that indisputably generate a continental shelf. As such, it not only sits on Vietnam’s claimed extended continental shelf, but also well on the Vietnamese side of any median line that might be negotiated between the two shelves from the Chinese and Vietnamese coasts, as indicated by the white lines in the map below.

A2:China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs appears to be basing its case on the assumption that Triton Island, 17 miles to the north of HD-981, or another of the Paracels meets the UNCLOS habitability requirement for generating its own continental shelf. If that were assumed to be true, then HD-981 would indeed fall within the maximum hypothetical area of dispute generated by the Paracels, shown in red below. This is the maximum dispute because it gives the tiny Paracel Islands equal weight in delimitation with the entire Vietnamese coast facing them—a proposition that borders on the absurd.

So China can make a legal case, however flimsy, for control over the continental shelf on which HD-981 sits. But that area is clearly in dispute. To unilaterally drill on it is a violation of UNCLOS’s admonition that states in a dispute, “in a spirit of understanding and cooperation, shall make every effort to enter into provisional arrangements,” and shall not “jeopardize or hamper the reaching of [a] final agreement.” It is also clearly contrary to the 2002 Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea that China signed with the members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), including Vietnam. In that agreement, all parties pledged to “exercise self-restraint in the conduct of activities that would complicate or escalate disputes and affect peace and stability.”

Hanoi, on the other hand, has restricted its oil and gas activities in the area to those fields, like blocks 118 and 119, that lie outside the maximum area of legal dispute.

A3:The deployment of HD-981, which Beijing insists will remain in place until August 15, has clearly ratcheted China-Vietnam tensions to a new level. Hanoi seems determined to disrupt the rig’s operations. And, in contrast to the Philippines, it has the capabilities—Russian-built Kilo-class submarines and an outdated but sizeable surface and air fleet—to do so. This means there is a real threat that acts of brinksmanship, like the recent ramming of Vietnamese vessels, could escalate quickly. Vietnam’s neighbors and outside partners like the United States must use every available channel to urge caution on both sides.

On the other hand, Vietnam’s relative naval capabilities will likely help temper Chinese assertiveness. After all, despite the presence of Chinese naval vessels around HD-981, it appeared that only Chinese Coast Guard vessels were involved in harassing and deterring Vietnamese ships attempting to enter the waters around the rig. The two nations’ and their leaders are as familiar with each other as anyone in the Asia Pacific, and they have substantial channels for communications, including top-level naval hotlines. This could also help avoid a larger crisis.

Vietnam has already launched a diplomatic campaign to build support abroad and paint China as the aggressor. Given other recent provocations by China against its neighbors, this will prove easy. This weekend, Vietnamese prime minister Nguyen Tan Dung will join his fellow leaders from across Southeast Asia at the ASEAN Summit. The placement of the drilling rig, along with China’s patrols at Malaysia’s James Shoal earlier this year and attempts to block resupply of Philippine troops at Second Thomas Shoal in March, will ensure that the South China Sea disputes take center stage. There is no telling who will blink first in the stand-off over HD-981, but the one thing that is certain is that China’s newest provocation will further heighten the threat perception among ASEAN states and drive them closer to each other and interested outside parties, especially Japan and the United States.

Ernest Bower is the Sumitro Chair for Southeast Asia Studies and Gregory Poling is a fellow with the Sumitro Chair for Southeast Asia Studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.

Critical Questionsis produced by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a private, tax-exempt institution focusing on international public policy issues. Its research is nonpartisan and nonproprietary. CSIS does not take specific policy positions. Accordingly, all views, positions, and conclusions expressed in this publication should be understood to be solely those of the author(s).

HONG KONG (Reuters) - China has spent nearly $1 billion on an ultra-deepwater rig that appears intended to explore disputed areas of the South China Sea, one of Asia’s most volatile hotspots and where the United States is strengthening ties with Beijing’s rival claimants.China National Offshore Oil Corporation"s (CNOOC) oil rig in China"s South Sea is seen in this photograph taken February 2, 2004. REUTERS/China Newsphoto

For now, the locally built Haiyang Shiyou (Offshore Oil) 981 rig owned by China’s state-run CNOOC oil company is drilling south of Hong Kong in an area within Beijing’s ambit.

But Chinese energy experts say Beijing will eventually move its first ultra-deepwater rig to explore in deeper and more oil-rich waters further south in the South China Sea, where China, Vietnam, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei have overlapping territorial claims.

“With Chinese offshore drilling technology improving, it is just a matter of time for them to enter the central and southern part of the South China Sea,” said Liu Feng, senior researcher at the state-backed National Institute for South China Sea Studies.

Asked whether CNOOC would move the rig to disputed waters, Lin Boqiang, professor and director of the China Center for Energy Economics Research at Xiamen University, said: “I feel they will ... If CNOOC does not do it, other countries will do it. So why (should) CNOOC not do it?”

The deepwater area of the South China Sea remains untapped, largely because tensions between rival claimants have made oil companies and private rig-builders reluctant to explore contentious acreage well away from sovereign coastlines.

CNOOC, or the China National Offshore Oil Corp, is an $89 billion company with oil and gas assets in Indonesia, Iraq, Australia, Africa, North and South America, as well as China.

It declined comment on whether it would move the 981 rig into disputed waters, although the company described the vessel as “mobile national territory” when it began drilling 320 km (200 miles) south of Hong Kong last month.

That sparked concerns that China’s quest for oil and gas to feed its economy would push Beijing into the disputed zone of the South China Sea and potentially a confrontation with other claimants.

“Large deepwater drilling rigs are our mobile national territory and strategic weapon for promoting the development of the country’s offshore oil industry,” the official Xinhua news agency quoted CNOOC Chairman Wang Yilin as saying.

“Activities in the East Sea by countries must abide by international laws ... and must not infringe upon sovereignty, sovereign rights and national jurisdiction of other countries,” said Luong Thanh Nghi, spokesman for Vietnam’s foreign ministry.

Vietnam and the Philippines have been the most vocal opponents of China. Last week, both China and the Philippines pulled back vessels from a group of rocks in the sea called the Scarborough Shoal, ending a two-month stand-off. Both cited bad weather as the reason.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta was in Vietnam this month and during a tour of the deep water port of Cam Ranh Bay, a key U.S. base during the Vietnam War, he said the use of the harbor would be important to the Pentagon as it moved more ships to Asia. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is also due to visit Hanoi next month.

Rich hydrocarbon resources are believed to lie below the centre and south of the South China Sea, which is in the disputed zone. Estimates for proven and undiscovered oil reserves in the entire sea range from 28 billion to as high as 213 billion barrels of oil, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said in a March 2008 report.

That would be equivalent to more than 60 years of current Chinese demand, under the most optimistic outlook, and surpass every country’s proven oil reserves except Saudi Arabia and Venezuela, according to the BP Statistical Review.

In a report last month, Xinhua news agency said about 70 percent of the oil and gas resources in the South China Sea were believed to exist in deep water.

Geologists have said most oil and gas resources likely lie in areas where the sea floor is between several hundred meters and 3,000 meters deep, although parts are up to 4,700 meters deep.

Using the 981 rig, China is capable of drilling for oil in waters as deep as 3,000 meters for the first time. The rig is now drilling at a depth of only 1,500 meters, another reason experts say it is likely to be moved further south.

China had to wait for its own ultra-deepwater rig as private rigs were unavailable for hire because of a global exploration boom. Utilization rates of deepwater rigs, including semi-submersibles and drill ships, have been in the range of 90-100 percent.

The equipment shortage has also deterred foreign companies from exploring the deep water of the South China Sea, in addition to their reluctance to venture into disputed territory.

“If you can drill in West Africa and the Gulf of Mexcio, Brazil and North Sea, why come to the South China Sea?” said Gordon Kwan, head of Energy Research at Mirae Asset Securities.

China, the world’s largest energy user, is already relying on imports for over half of its oil needs. It has long hoped to expand deepwater exploration in the South China Sea as onshore production growth sags.

So far, the offshore exploration of CNOOC and the other two Chinese state oil giants PetroChina and Sinopec Corp has been largely limited to waters along or close to China’s continental shelf. Foreign firms like Husky and Eni hold offshore deepwater production sharing contracts with CNOOC.

But deployment of the CNOOC rig and suggestions China has developed the expertise needed to build complex ancillary equipment, including pipe-laying ships, signals the exploration could move south.

CNOOC, which derives nearly all its domestic output from shallow waters, has vowed to build deepwater capacity of one million barrels of oil equivalents per day by 2020, more than doubling the company’s total production.

“Is CNOOC doing this because they desperately need to deliver production growth? Absolutely,” said Simon Powell, head of Asian Oil and Gas Research at CLSA. “Are they also doing it at the government request to plant the national flag so to speak? I have no idea.”

Any decision to push into disputed waters will be taken by policymakers in Beijing, not CNOOC. Some industry observers say any exploration is unlikely in the area while tensions remain high.

Still, CNOOC, which has struggled to deliver production growth, may want to exploit nationalistic sentiment to drum up state support for its deepwater exploration agenda, analysts said.

“Chinese state media seemed to be excited by the rig, the technology,” said Li Mingjiang, an assistant professor and a China expert at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University. “By playing up nationalism, it could help CNOOC gain more state policy support, more investment.”

Discoveries near the coasts of Southeast Asian countries in recent years were mostly natural gas, reinforcing the belief among geologists and explorers there should be more gas than oil in the South China Sea.

“Aside from geopolitical risk, the bigger question is if 981 finds anything, is it more likely to be gas than oil?” CLSA’s Powell said. “If they find natural gas in 1 or 2 km (deep) waters, then it could very likely be stranded gas. In other words, it is uneconomic.”

The Penglai Oilfield sits in Northeastern China’s Bohai Sea, China’s largest offshore oil and gas production base. In 1999, the Penglai-19-3 field was discovered through the joint efforts of ConocoPhillips China and CNOOC. Given complexities of the Bohai Sea, ConocoPhillips and CNOOC decided to employ a phased development approach to the project.

The first phase, the early oil production project, came on stream at the end of 2002, through Wellhead Platform A and the Ming Zhu Floating Production, Storage and Offloading (FPSO) vessel. Gathering requisite information about the reservoir, water-flood patterns and the drilling and oil processing techniques prepared us for a successful and safe project and gave the project partners the confidence to embark on full field development.

First oil from Phase 2 was produced at WHP-C and delivered to Ming Zhu FPSO in July 2007. Six additional platforms and one of the world’s largest floating production vessels Peng Bo were constructed in Phase 2. At peak, the construction of the Phase 2 project involved over 8,000 workers in 12 locations in 5 countries, making it a world-class operation in China, both in terms of technological complexity and productivity.

In 2014 ConocoPhillips entered a new era of collaboration, as operational control of the Bohai Penglai Field was transferred to CNOOC Limited per the terms of Production Sharing Contract (PSC) 20 years after the original Bohai PSC was signed. Later that month, the newest phase of field development began when Chairman and CEO Ryan Lance approved the first new platform to be installed since the Bohai Phase 2 project was completed in 2010.

The Bohai Penglai asset is managed by CNOOC China Limited and ConocoPhillips China through a joint management committee (JMC). CNOOC China Limited holds 51 percent working interest, and ConocoPhillips holds the remaining 49 percent. The Peng Bo Operating Company was established within CNOOC’s Tianjin branch office to operate the Penglai Field, the largest within CNOOC ’s Bohai Sea portfolio. Twenty-two ConocoPhillips China personnel are directly involved with CNOOC in Tianjin, in the JMC fabrication yards, professional representative positions, and project management team and technical secondee roles. ConocoPhillips China’s Beijing office provides management oversight, multidisciplinary technical support and administrative capabilities.

Bohai Phase 3, which began operations in third quarter 2018 is the largest new project initiated since the ConocoPhillips upstream-downstream split. The project includes three wellhead platforms, three drilling-completion-workover rigs, a central process platform, 186 new wells, 49 sidetracks and brownfield modifications.

We are honored to help China develop such a sustainable world-class operation. It is reassuring that the project will continue to make contributions to secure energy supplies for the Chinese economy.

This article is about the onshore oil rig. For offshore oil rig, see Oil platform. For drilling tunnels, see Tunnel boring machine. For handheld drilling tool, see Drill.

A drilling rig is an integrated system that drills wells, such as oil or water wells, in the earth"s subsurface. Drilling rigs can be massive structures housing equipment used to drill water wells, oil wells, or natural gas extraction wells, or they can be small enough to be moved manually by one person and such are called augers. Drilling rigs can sample subsurface mineral deposits, test rock, soil and groundwater physical properties, and also can be used to install sub-surface fabrications, such as underground utilities, instrumentation, tunnels or wells. Drilling rigs can be mobile equipment mounted on trucks, tracks or trailers, or more permanent land or marine-based structures (such as oil platforms, commonly called "offshore oil rigs" even if they don"t contain a drilling rig). The term "rig" therefore generally refers to the complex equipment that is used to penetrate the surface of the Earth"s crust.

Small to medium-sized drilling rigs are mobile, such as those used in mineral exploration drilling, blast-hole, water wells and environmental investigations. Larger rigs are capable of drilling through thousands of metres of the Earth"s crust, using large "mud pumps" to circulate drilling mud (slurry) through the drill bit and up the casing annulus, for cooling and removing the "cuttings" while a well is drilled. Hoists in the rig can lift hundreds of tons of pipe. Other equipment can force acid or sand into reservoirs to facilitate extraction of the oil or natural gas; and in remote locations there can be permanent living accommodation and catering for crews (which may be more than a hundred). Marine rigs may operate thousands of miles distant from the supply base with infrequent crew rotation or cycle.

Antique drilling rig now on display at Western History Museum in Lingle, Wyoming. It was used to drill many water wells in that area—many of those wells are still in use.

Until internal combustion engines were developed in the late 19th century, the main method for drilling rock was muscle power of man or animal. The technique of oil drilling through percussion or rotary drilling has its origins dating back to the ancient Chinese Han Dynasty in 100 BC, where percussion drilling was used to extract natural gas in the Sichuan province.Edwin Drake to drill Pennsylvania"s first oil well in 1859 using small steam engines to power the drilling process rather than by human muscle.Cable tool drilling was developed in ancient China and was used for drilling brine wells. The salt domes also held natural gas, which some wells produced and which was used for evaporation of the brine.

In the 1970s, outside of the oil and gas industry, roller bits using mud circulation were replaced by the first pneumatic reciprocating piston Reverse Circulation (RC) drills, and became essentially obsolete for most shallow drilling, and are now only used in certain situations where rocks preclude other methods. RC drilling proved much faster and more efficient, and continues to improve with better metallurgy, deriving harder, more durable bits, and compressors delivering higher air pressures at higher volumes, enabling deeper and faster penetration. Diamond drilling has remained essentially unchanged since its inception.

Oil and natural gas drilling rigs are used not only to identify geologic reservoirs, but also used to create holes that allow the extraction of oil or natural gas from those reservoirs. Primarily in onshore oil and gas fields once a well has been drilled, the drilling rig will be moved off of the well and a service rig (a smaller rig) that is purpose-built for completions will be moved on to the well to get the well on line.

Mining drilling rigs are used for two main purposes, exploration drilling which aims to identify the location and quality of a mineral, and production drilling, used in the production-cycle for mining. Drilling rigs used for rock blasting for surface mines vary in size dependent on the size of the hole desired, and is typically classified into smaller pre-split and larger production holes. Underground mining (hard rock) uses a variety of drill rigs dependent on the desired purpose, such as production, bolting, cabling, and tunnelling.

In early oil exploration, drilling rigs were semi-permanent in nature and the derricks were often built on site and left in place after the completion of the well. In more recent times drilling rigs are expensive custom-built machines that can be moved from well to well. Some light duty drilling rigs are like a mobile crane and are more usually used to drill water wells. Larger land rigs must be broken apart into sections and loads to move to a new place, a process which can often take weeks.

Small mobile drilling rigs are also used to drill or bore piles. Rigs can range from 100 short tons (91,000 kg) continuous flight auger (CFA) rigs to small air powered rigs used to drill holes in quarries, etc. These rigs use the same technology and equipment as the oil drilling rigs, just on a smaller scale.

The drilling mechanisms outlined below differ mechanically in terms of the machinery used, but also in terms of the method by which drill cuttings are removed from the cutting face of the drill and returned to surface.

An automated drill rig (ADR) is an automated full-sized walking land-based drill rig that drills long lateral sections in horizontal wells for the oil and gas industry.Athabasca oil sands. According to the "Oil Patch Daily News", "Each rig will generate 50,000 man-hours of work during the construction phase and upon completion, each operating rig will directly and indirectly employ more than 100 workers." Compared to conventional drilling rigs", Ensign, an international oilfield services contractor based in Calgary, Alberta, that makes ADRs claims that they are "safer to operate, have "enhanced controls intelligence," "reduced environmental footprint, quick mobility and advanced communications between field and office."steam assisted gravity drainage (SAGD) applications was mobilized by Deer Creek Energy Limited, a Calgary-based oilsands company.

Temple, Robert; Joseph Needham (1986). The Genius of China: 3000 years of science, discovery and invention. New York: Simon and Schuster. pp. 52–4link)

Baars, D.L.; Watney, W.L.; Steeples, D.W.; Brostuen, E.A (1989). Petroleum; a primer for Kansas (Educational Series, no. 7 ed.). Kansas Geological Survey. p. 40. Archived from the original on 8 November 2020. Retrieved 18 April 2011. After the cementing of the casing has been completed, the drilling rig, equipment, and materials are removed from the drill site. A smaller rig, known as a workover rig or completion rig, is moved over the well bore. The smaller rig is used for the remaining completion operations.

"Ensign Launches Newest And Most Powerful Automated ADR 1500S Pad Drill Rigs In Montney Play", New Tech Magazine, Calgary, Alberta, 21 November 2014, archived from the original on 10 December 2014, retrieved 6 December 2014

Chinese authorities plan to position their first homegrown semi-submersible oil rig in a deep-water field in the disputed South China Sea to show rivals how far it’s willing to go for energy security and possibly to expand its political clout, observers believe.

The platform built over the past 21 months will begin work at the Lingshui 17-2 gas field 150 kilometers away from China, domestic media outlets said January 18. The site happens to be China’s first deep-water gas field in the sea, which is contested by five other governments.

While the proposed drilling site lies within China’s exclusive economic zone of 370 kilometers from its shorelines, Beijing"s widespread reporting of the new platform shows the other claimants and rival superpower Washington how far it could go in securing fuel for domestic use, analysts say.

“I assume they’ll probably put it in contested waters and leave it there for a few days until whoever gets upset,” said Stephen Nagy, senior associate professor of politics and international studies at International Christian University in Tokyo.

“We really don’t know what they’re going to do, but I think it’s just further evidence of China staking a stronger claim in the South China Sea, pushback against the United States and other countries who are putting pressure on China or at least arguing that China doesn’t have sovereignty within the region,” he said.

Beijing claims about 90% of the South China Sea and cites historic usage records to back its position. China has used its technological and military superiority over the other claimants to develop islets in the sea, which stretches from its southern coasts to the island of Borneo. Rival claimants Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam drill for oil and gas in the same 3.5 million-square-kilometer sea.

In this image taken from video provided by VTV, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi speaks during an online meeting with ASEAN foreign ministers on Sept. 9, 2020.

Vietnam’s claims come closest to the Chinese gas field and Hanoi is unlikely to protest if the rig stays on site without expanding, said Alexander Vuving, professor at the Daniel K. Inouye Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies in Hawaii. But in 2014 a Chinese rig positioned in disputed waters touched off boat ramming and deadly anti-China riots in Vietnam. That sort of flap could pop up again, Vuving said.

“China’s assertiveness has become a new normal,” he said. “If China is really thinking in terms of calming the waters, then they would probably be a little more cautious, but of course China has been very assertive, even aggressive, since a decade now.”

State-run China Daily’s news website calls the creation the world’s heaviest deep-water semi-submersible oil production and storage platform. It has three “world-class” innovations and 13 “domestic advanced technologies”, the website said January 14.

Wording of that type suggests that China wants to impress on the world that the platform can help it get the fuel that it needs, said Aaron Rabena, research fellow at the Asia-Pacific Pathways to Progress Foundation in the Philippines. The world factory powerhouse depends on oil and gas for manufacturing.

A net oil importer since 1993, China aims to ease its “fear of strategic vulnerability” by looking abroad for fuel, developing natural gas and expanding refineries in the Middle East, the RAND Corp.-published book China’s Quest for Energy Security says.

The super-sized drilling setup might help China shine politically, too, as it pushes other countries to explore jointly for undersea fuel, analysts say.

Development of the homegrown platform could “stir up” discussions over joint oil and gas exploration in the South China Sea again, the Chinese state-controlled news outlet Global Times said in 2019.

In 2018 China offered the Philippines 60% of any discoveries made in a disputed tract of sea. The Philippines is ready to “support companies of the two countries in joint oil and gas development”, the Chinese foreign ministry said on its website in October 2020.

The South China Sea holds about 11 billion barrels of oil and 190 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, the U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates.

Oilfield special vehicles, overrun car, the engine net power 274kW. Protrusive amount: 3000mm. Exceeding 4 m detachable parts. Side guards material is Q195 steel trough, is bolted connections; subject to limited protection after special equipment can not be installed. ABS Model: JABS, ABS Manufacturer: Jiaozuo Borack Control Technology Limited.