AI-Drill – Deliver Wells Faster and Safer

Drilling is a complex process with potentially high risks for offshore workers and accounts for approximately 30% of total costs on the Norwegian continental Shelf (NCS). Therefore, optimization of drilling operations by applying new technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) that can improve safety and reduce costs is a high priority. For geothermal energy, subsurface CO2 sequestration or hydrogen storage, efficient drilling technologies play an even more significant role and can unlock significant value, as these are more cost sensitive than traditional oil and gas. The future of drilling will incorporate more automation, contributing to increased safety by reducing the potential for human errors. The human errors caused by the inability or, in some cases, unwillingness to react to the early signs of potentially detrimental events have led to some catastrophic events in the oil industry, such as the Macondo accident in the Gulf of Mexico. AI Drill aims to contribute to the future of drilling by developing tools that automatically integrates accumulated knowledge from previous operations and that provides recommendation and warnings during drilling operations. The project will leverage physics-informed AI/ML (PIAI), explainable AI (XAI) and human-in-the-loop (HITL) techniques to bridge the industry’s transition from traditional complex physical models to modern data-driven approaches.