System and method for surface steerable drilling

A method for drilling a borehole comprising:

• receiving, by a surface steerable system, feedback information from a drilling rig engaged in using a drill bit to drill a borehole in a formation;
• calculating, by the surface steerable system, an estimated position of the drill bit in the formation based on the feedback information;
• comparing, by the surface steerable system, the estimated position of the drill bit to a desired position of the drill bit along a planned path of the borehole;
• calculating, by the surface steerable system, a plurality of solutions if the comparison indicates that the estimated position is outside a defined margin of error relative to the desired position, wherein each of the plurality of solutions defines a path from the estimated position to the planned path;
• calculating, by the surface steerable system, a cost of each of the plurality of solutions;
• selecting, by the surface steerable system, a first solution from the plurality of solutions based at least partly on the cost of the first solution;
• producing, by the surface steerable system, control information representing the first solution;
• and
• outputting, by the surface steerable system, the control information for the drilling rig;
• and drilling, by the drilling rig, at least a portion of the borehole based on the control information.

A surface steerable system for use with a drilling rig comprising:

• a network interface;
• a processor coupled to the network interface;
• and
• a memory coupled to the processor, the memory storing a plurality of instructions for execution by the processor, the plurality of instructions including:
• instructions for receiving a plurality of inputs including a planned path for a borehole, formation information for the borehole, drilling rig equipment information for the drilling rig, bottom hole assembly (BHA) equipment information for a BHA coupled to the drilling rig, a set of financial cost parameters, and a set of reliability parameters;
• instructions for processing the planned path, the formation information, the drilling rig equipment information, the BHA equipment information, the set of financial cost parameters, and the set of reliability parameters to produce a set of control parameters for the drilling rig, wherein the control parameters define a plurality of drilling operations to be executed by the drilling rig to form the borehole;
• instructions for outputting the set of control parameters for the drilling rig;
• instructions for processing feedback information received from the drilling rig to determine whether an estimated position of a drill bit coupled to the drilling rig is within a defined margin of error of a desired point along the planned path;
• instructions for calculating a plurality of convergence plans if the estimated position of the drill bit does not match the desired point, wherein each of the plurality of convergence plans defines a solution vector to realign the drill bit with the planned path based on the feedback information and a set of target parameters;
• instructions for selecting one of the plurality of convergence plans;
• instructions for producing a set of revised control parameters representing the convergence plan;
• instructions for outputting the set of revised control parameters for the drilling rig;
• and
• instructions for providing a local database configured to store data representing the planned path, the formation information, the drilling rig equipment information, the BHA equipment information, the set of financial cost parameters, and the set of reliability parameters.