Completions for Dummies

Downhole completions

Careers, we guess, are pretty much like any other topic: if you want to learn what a [name of occupation] does, your best bet is to ask someone who has the job. Your second best bet is to ask someone who's seen the job done. Around the Antisocial Network, we suspect that your worst bet is to ask someone at a Demand Media (now Leaf Group) site: if you do that, you're likely to end up with rubbish like eHow.com's Shanea Patterson threw together for "The Job Description of a Completions Engineer," now appearing at Leaf Group's niche site CareerTrend.com.

In the same vein as Lloyd Bentsen lecturing Dan Quayle, our chief geologist said, "Shanea, you're no completions engineer. I've known completions engineers...", etc. Yes, Patterson got part of her "definition" right – sort of:

"Completions engineers design and monitor the installation of cost-effective well completions. Completions engineers are often called petroleum engineers and help devise methods to improve oil and gas well production."

Nice description, Shanea. Just one question, though: what's a completion? Well, another thing – saying, "Completions engineers are often called petroleum engineers" is akin to saying that pianists are often called musicians. In fact, a completions engineer is a petroleum engineer: it's a specialization within the profession.

Patterson blithely copied some verbiage out of a job description, to wit:

"A completions engineer must direct and monitor the completion and evaluation of well testing, wells in general or well surveys; maintain records of drilling and production operations, monitor production rates, plan or rework processes to improve production, and write technical reports for engineering and management personnel. He must also coordinate the installation, maintenance and operation of mining and oil field equipment and develop plans for oil and gas field drilling."

That's all well and good if you're already familiar with the terminology (Shanea wasn't). In reality, the completions engineer is responsible for finishing the job after an oil or gas well has reached its target and been determined to be productive (you don't need completion on dry holes, Shanea). "Completion," in the petroleum industry, is (per the Schlumberger Oilfield Glossary),

"A generic term used to describe the assembly of downhole tubulars and equipment required to enable safe and efficient production from an oil or gas well."

In other words, the completions engineer is the petroleum engineer responsible for designing the equipment that turns the hole an oil company just drilled into a producing well, and does so in a manner that 1) is cost-effective, 2) is safe, and 3) does not damage the reservoir.

That's what completions engineers do, Shanea, For doing nothing but rewording some job description you found online, your reward is a brass-plated plaque inscribed with your name, today's date, and the title "Dumbass of the Day." Display it with pride: you earned it.

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