Baker Hughes has introduced a new tubing retrievable, subsurface safety valve for ultra deep-set, deepwater and high pressure-high temperature applications.

 

The new REACH subsurface safety valves can be set as deep as 20,000 feet (6,096 metres) and ensure fail-safe-closed operation using reliable, field-proven, heavy sprung closure technology.

 

The new valve offers a single control line operating system for deepwater HPHT wells. It can be controlled from the surface, allowing personnel to monitor its operation remotely.

 

REACH valves are tested in accordance with the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) adoption of the American Petroleum Institute’s industry standards that ensure the use of “the best available and safest technologies while operating in the Outer Continental Shelf” (API 14A 11th Ed).

 

The valve’s design isolates wellbore tubing pressure from the hydraulic operating control system, which enables the opening of the valve at much lower operating pressure than previous heavy-sprung valves. A nitrogen charge system is not necessary. This feature makes the REACH valve ideal for applications with opening pressure limitations, such as subsea completions, high-pressure wells and fields where the rig site and other control facilities may have supply pressure capability limitations.

 

The REACH valve incorporates proven features from other Baker Hughes subsurface safety valve designs, such as: flapper closure technology with very high gas flow rate closures; RBT housing thread technology; dynamic seal technology and debris exclusion geometries. These design features have been proven in more than 20,000 global installations of Baker Hughes safety valves. The REACH valve could be used globally, including applications in the Gulf of Mexico, West Africa and Malaysia.