Asian Drill wins $2.5m work
Dibrugarh-based workforce management contractor Asian Drill Tech mobilised last month (August 2023) for a Rs21cr ($2.5m) Oil India contract.
Under the contract, won in July 2023, Asian must provide operation and maintenance services for drilling Water Disposal Wells (WDW) for four years until October 7 (2027), according to Oil India sources. A disposal well is often a depleted oil or gas well into which waste fluids can be injected for safe disposal.
Oil India opened technical bids on May 9 (2023) after inviting offers on April 1 (2023). Asian has been around for a decade but incorporated as a limited partnership firm only in 2022.
As far back as 2010, the firm had won a Rs2cr ($241,000) workforce management contract at Oil India. In the latest tender, where Oil India opened technical bids on May 9 (2023) after inviting offers on April 1 (2023), Asian beat four other bidders: Mercantile Associates, Assam Petroleum, Petrotech and South Asia Consultancy.
All four have previously worked for Oil India. "Under the contract, the contractor shall provide man-management services for medium duty workover rig to be provided by Oil Indi to carry out drilling shallow wells for disposal of associated formation water produced along with crude oil or any other purpose in Assam and Arunachal Pradesh," says the tender.
"Wells are around 1600 metres depth." Oil India last completed a water disposal well, WDW-221, to 1448 metres at the Naharkatiya field in Assam using a 750-hp rig in July 2023.
"Since it was an S-shaped well, directional (drilling contractor) Newsco was involved," says a source. Asian will be responsible for rig operation, rig up, rig down, dismantling, assembling mud tanks, water tanks and fittings, as well as pumps and engines or rig electrical wiring, restoring power and water supplies, and mud services.