RE:RE:AWFUL: TMX Under SEVERE THREAT Of DELAY & COSTLY BLOWOUT ?Not sure from where you are getting your information concerning preceived problems with the possibility of increased water infiltration by enlarging the borehole to 48" ztransform173, but Trans Mountain's letter to the CER dated November 22, 2023 clearly explained their concerns on this;
"Challenges encountered to date, as described further below, include hard abrasive rock formations causing tooling damage and tool failure, and water infiltration causing hole cleaning inefficiencies, excess drilling waste, and contributing to tooling damage".
" If an increase in water inflow is encountered, performing an NPS 36 line pull in the presence of elevated discharge at the pipe entry location would present significant logistical, technical and safety challenges".
From the Oral proceedings from November 27th, 2023, on p.23 Mr Goulet also explains the concerns with excessive water infiltration:
"we wouldn't be able to effectively ream anymore because the viscosity of the fluid in the hole would not allow us to remove the cuttings as we're reaming".
"And if that -- if that occurred, we would -- we would actually have to abandon the hole potentially, and so that's the significant risk associated with the water problem. We've mitigated it to date through grouting off those zones, but the larger diameter that we go, the more risk we have of those -- of that grout failing and for the water ingress to increase back to what we saw when we did the original pilot hole".
What is clear to me with Trans Mountain Pipeline's letter to the CER dated December 14th, is that Trans Mountain now realizes that they did not emphasize strongly enough in the Variance Application process what could occur if excess water infiltration occurs during the enlarging of the present borehole.
We also need to keep in mind that the Canada Energy Regulator has not yet released it's reasons for denying the Variance request on December 5th.
Kherson