A Very Brief History of Offshore Drilling

: Offshore drilling for oil began off the coast of Summerfield, Calif., just south of Santa Barbara. Rows of narrow wooden piers that looked like boardwalks extended up to 1,350 feet from the shoreline, their piles reaching 35 feet to the floor of the Pacific Ocean. Using the same techniques then used on land, steel pipes were pounded 455 feet below the seabed. The field produced a modest yield, peaked in and was abandoned several years later. The project left behind a beach blackened by oil and marred by rotting piers and derricks. A winter storm in destroyed many of the derricks.  The remnants of America&#;s pioneering offshore rigs were wiped out by a strong tidal wave in .

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: An offshore milestone was reached when Kerr-McGee Oil Industries drilled the first productive well beyond the sight of land, in shallow water about 10.5 miles off the Louisiana coast.

: Congress failed to pass a bill authorizing the federal leasing of subsea drilling, bringing offshore drilling to the halt. States had leased areas off their coasts, but President Harry Truman asserted in exclusive federal jurisdiction over the entire continental shelf. The U.S. Supreme Court in and upheld Truman&#;s claim, but no federal law allowed the U.S. Department of Interior to issue offshore leases.

: Two landmarks bills were passed to settle the impasse. The Submerged Lands Act gave most states the right to lease up to three nautical miles from the coast. It allowed two states, Florida and Texas, to claim a nine-mile jurisdiction. The Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act then gave the federal government the authority to issue leases beyond state jurisdiction. The federally administrated area became known as the Outer Continental Shelf, or OCS. It&#;s a legal designation that&#;s more reflective of legislative negotiations than the actual geology of the seafloor.

: Offshore production of oil in federal waters stood at only 133,000 barrels a day, or about 2 percent of total U.S. production.

: The Prudhoe Bay State No. 1 exploratory well discovered what would become the largest oil field in North America in state waters off the north coast of Alaska. Regular production began the following year, exceeding a million barrels a day by .

: A blowout at a Union Oil Co. well located in the Santa Barbara Channel produced an 800-square-mile slick of oil that blackened an estimated 30 miles of Southern California beaches and soaked a substantial number of sea birds in the gooey mess. The blowout lasted 11 days and ultimately released about 80,000 barrels of oil. It was at the time the greatest offshore drilling accident in American waters. It prompted stronger federal protections and inspired the first Earth Day.

: Offshore production in federal waters reached 1.7 million barrels a day, roughly 20 percent of U.S. production.

: The first discovery in deep water &#; depths of 1,000 feet or more, though definitions vary &#; came at Shell Oil Co.&#;s Cognac field in the Gulf of Mexico. Technology had yet to evolve from shallow to deep water, just as it took a while to develop from land to sea. Advances in that technology in the s would begin shifting production in the Gulf to deeper water.

: Congress started including a provision in appropriations bills that prohibited offshore oil and gas development in the majority of the OCS. President George H.W. Bush in issued a similar directive that also banned offshore drilling in the majority of the OCS, which was extended by President Clinton in until . Despite these moratoriums, drilling was allowed to continue in large portions of the Gulf of Mexico and off the Alaskan coastline. President George W. Bush subsequently rescinded the executive branch offshore drilling moratorium and in introduced an updated schedule for - that contained proposals to lease lands for drilling off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts.

: Offshore production in federal waters stood at only 1.1 million barrels a day &#; just 5 percent more than a decade earlier. A collapse in world oil prices in the mid-s had stalled the expansion of onshore and offshore drilling and had struck a devastating blow to the economies of Louisiana and Texas.

: More than half of the exploratory wells in U.S. waters proved successful thanks in large part to improvements in 3-D seismic technology.

Late s: Production in deep water &#; a minor factor just 10 years earlier &#; surpassed that in shallow water for the first time. Five years later, deep water produced twice as much as shallow water, and an increasing amount of oil was coming from ultra-deep water &#; 5,000 feet and deeper.

: Offshore oil in federal waters topped two million barrels a day after 13 consecutive years of increased production.

: New federal legislation allotted Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama a 37.5 percent share of the revenues derived from leasing activity in the so-called 181 South area off the coast of Alabama.

: Lease and royalty payments to the federal government reached a record $18 billion. The payments have become the second-largest source of federal revenue after income taxes.

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: A blowout at BP&#;s Deepwater Horizon well in the Gulf of Mexico is the largest accidental marine oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry. The U.S. government estimates that 4.9 million barrels gushed from the leak for 87 days before it was sealed. The Obama administration put a halt to all deepwater lease sales after the spill, including one scheduled off Virginia.

: The Obama administration opens the Atlantic to seismic testing. Offshore oil production in federal waters falls to 1.3 million barrels a day &#; almost all from the Gulf of Mexico &#; after reaching a high of almost 1.7 million before the BP blowout.

: The federal government releases a draft offshore leasing plan for - that for the first time in decades includes portions of the Atlantic OCS, including offshore North Carolina.

The history of oil extraction, drilling, and drill pipe technology in the US is just 160 years old. In the &#;s, the first official oil company known to merge in the US was the Pennsylvania Rock Oil Company. Just a few years later, the company reorganized into Seneca Oil and was established as a petroleum exploratory company. With the desire to discover the various uses for &#;rock&#; or &#;coal oil&#;, investors began hiring engineers and scientists to find ways to obtain and test it.

The Birth of Drill Pipe Technology

One such oil worker and former railroad-man named Edwin Drake built the first official US drilling system that brought about ground-breaking results. Drake&#;s major crude discovery occurred in Oil Creek, Pennsylvania near Titusville in . Back then, the celebrated and newfound crude oil was used primarily to make kerosene for lasting illumination. They also found other ways to use petroleum products and dramatically improve the lives of early American settlers.

To drill this pioneering oil well down 69.5 feet, Drake utilized a steam engine and a cable-tool drilling rig. However, these drilling technologies weren&#;t Drake&#;s only innovative contributions to the blossoming oil industry. He also developed the drive pipe and a method for driving drill pipe down the wellbore to protect its integrity. Ultimately, his methods revolutionized a then-nascent drilling industry, and the US boom began.

Early Industry Growth

As drilling and drill pipe technology advanced and oil became more readily available, Americans found more innovative uses for oil and more progressive ways to drill for it. New uses included lubricating various newly-invested machines, fueling machines, and sources of heat. Today, the original drilling site for Drake&#;s well is recognized as a National Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmark.

After Drake&#;s success in Oil Creek, other ventures quickly sprung up across Pennsylvania and slightly southwest-ward to other states. This region expanded down the Ohio River into Ohio and Kentucky, and through West Virginia. The amount of oil produced in this area alone placed it on the map as it quickly rose to become the US&#;s leading producer. That was at least until the westward expansion.

By the late &#;s many other western states and regions began drilling commercial wells and also experiencing great success. From the first well drilled in Kansas in to another in Texas in , by the early &#;s, oil drilling rigs were being established across the country all the way out to California. Today, Texas still remains one of the nation&#;s leading producers of crude oil.

Modern Drilling

While Drake and his contemporaries were experimenting with technologies intended to retrieve crude oil exclusively, today&#;s drilling operations are far more diverse. Natural gas remains a growing industry thanks to its comparatively low cost and lower carbon emissions. With the development of technologies for removing natural gas from shale, expansion of the industry has continued for more than a century. Oil producers and industry engineers continue to find ways to preserve the environment while also utilizing clean energy.

Drill Pipe Protection

Early oil wells weren&#;t as efficient compared to today&#;s modern marvels; yet, they provided a new age of comfort and convenience for Americans. Today&#;s companies must contend with far more competition and far stricter environmental controls. As such, it&#;s essential to find ways to protect their equipment from harsh environmental conditions and accidents.

MSI Pipe Protection Products

The use of pipe protection products such as line pipe protectors and thread protectors for oil drilling has become an industry standard. MSI&#;s products allow companies to more efficiently retrieve oil and gas with less concern over equipment damage or hazardous conditions. For more than three decades, our leading API standard quality products have been helping change the way oil companies do business.

We&#;re also here to help you. Call MSI Pipe Protection Technologies for orders and more information at 1-877-276-.

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