Drilling Rig Power System

[CrofterMannie]

I can't believe I've been working on a drilling rig for 18 months and only yesterday heard that we are about to install an NOV 'Powerblade" system.

In summary, one of our big power draws is the draw works - effectively a crane for pulling the drill string in and out of hole which goes up and down 45m at a time with a 200t load on it. Power demand spikes as you lift and goes to zero as you lower but the diesel generators have to cover peak demand all the time.
The new system will, as the load descends, collect energy in both a flywheel and in a battery to be used when pulling up this removing the spikes in power demand and allowing less generators to be run. They say this can reduce peak demand by 6MW which will save about 5tons of diesel a day.

I'm not sure I've ever heard of a flywheel system being used commercially like this.
It will be interesting to see it working.

https://www.nov.com/products/powerblade ... ery-system