"...research, technology, information and networking for the upstream petroleum industry..."
Co-ordination and networking are key elements in PSTI's activities. In this issue of NETWORK UPDATE specific examples are highlighted: we are confident that all will add tangible value to our Members' businesses.
PSTI and the Marine Technology Directorate Limited (MTD) are collaborating to develop a major programme of research targeting high temperature - high pressure production issues. This programme is due to receive substantial UK government funds. PSTI's HP/HT Technical Interest Group has been evaluating research proposals. As part of the UK Technology Foresight exercise, PSTI has contributed its views on industry's strategic research needs. The submission was made jointly with MTD and OSO. PSTI's input was prepared from a synthesis of information from the PSTI Membership network.As part of a continuous process of improving our communications, PSTI has joined the INTERNET. Over the coming months we will be exploring with individual Members how the benefits of communication via the INTERNET might best be achieved.
PSTI and ERC-Tigress Limited have concluded a commercialisation agreement for the transfer of the HEDERA basin modelling software. Moving HEDERA from an R&D project to a commercial product marks another important milestone for PSTI in demonstrating commitment to, and capability in, operating at the R&D/industry interface, moving research from universities to industrial use in a cost effective manner.
The PSTI team of geoscientists and software engineers responsible for the HEDERA development also have been transferred to ERC-Tigress under the agreement. The team will continue to develop the HEDERA software and use their specialist geological and object-oriented computing skills to enhance other products and services offered by ERC-Tigress. The R&D conducted by the PSTI team during the period 1992-94 built on the results of earlier research council and industry investments in basin analysis and modelling research notably at Oxford and Newcastle universities and at Royal Holloway, University of London. Additional advice and assistance was provided by researchers in geoscience, computing and artificial intelligence departments at Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Glasgow universities, altogether marking out the HEDERA initiative as a significant and successful example of national research co-ordination and collaboration.Since 1991, PSTI has supported Dr Haluk Toral and Jianhang Qiu of Imperial College (ICSTM) in their efforts to advance a new type of non-intrusive multiphase flowmeter. This project built on earlier speculative research in stochastic measurement techniques funded, in part, by Deminex and Shell. Based on recent promising research results, Shell offered Dr Toral support for a site evaluation of a prototype instrument. To achieve this step towards commercialisation has required a small further extension of the PSTI project to mid-1995. In recognition of the Institute's commitment to the project in 1991, ICMST granted PSTI commercial rights over any successful flowmeter based on results from this novel research.
Welcome to Z & S Geology, who have joined PSTI's Small Company Membership Scheme.
The Government's White Paper on science, engineering and technology "Realising our potential" published in 1993 proposed a UK Technology Foresight Programme to identify areas of strategic research likely to yield the greatest benefits to the nation's economic performance and quality of life. The Foresight process now underway sets out to involve scientists, engineers, industry, academia, government, and financial institutions.
Consultation is the key to the success of the Foresight Programme. Fifteen Panels were set up in April 1994 to take forward the foresight process and assess relative priorities simultaneously across a broad range of sectors.
The Panels which have direct relevance to the petroleum industry are:-
The first task of the Panels was to prepare by August 1994, preliminary views on market and technological opportunities in their sectors over the next 10 to 20 years.
The next phase, Wider Consultation, takes place during September to December 1994. Several regional workshops are being organised (PSTI is hosting one of the workshops for the ANRE panel in Edinburgh on October 4 1994). A report of this wider consultation will be completed by each panel by the end of December 1994.
The third phase, Assessment of Priorities takes place during January 1995, culminating in final reports from each panel on sector priorities by the end of January 1995. The Steering Group for the Programme will prepare their final, overall report for submission to Government by the end of February 1995
Horizontal Well Technology Unit is a joint venture between PSTI and Heriot-Watt University. The Unit is led by its Director Professor Jim Peden, Shell UK Professor in Petroleum Engineering, with Dr Graham Webber, PSTI Senior Research Fellow. Underpinning financial support for the Unit also comes from Enterprise Oil plc.
Objectives:
The Unit's activities and capabilities address the full range of horizontal well issues, from geoscience and reservoir technology, focused on candidate selection, planning and design, to the technology of implementation, drilling, completion and hydrocarbons production.
Activities and achievements:
The Unit is currently conducting a number of geoscience and production engineering R&D projects sponsored by PSTI members and other international companies. Examples include work on the development of design guides, on fluid placement during stimulation, and on performance prediction in particular reservoir formations. In addition, the Unit conducts technical studies for individual companies focused on specific problem solving or planning tasks.
As another key activity, the Unit convenes the Horizontal Well Technology Forum. The events attract large international audiences. The most recent Forum addressed "performance vs expectations" issues and included technical presentations from 10 companies. In addition, as part of its information and technology transfer process, the Unit conducts specialised training courses for industry.
Finally, with the development of the Unit as a knowledge centre for horizontal well research, development and applications, the Unit has launched, in association with Petroleum Abstracts (The University of Tulsa), the Horizontal Well Technology Information Service.
In a recent evaluation of PSTI's investment of its Membership subscription income in the Horizontal Well Technology Unit, the Institute's Science Advisory Committee concluded that "a new centre of excellence had been established with effective links to industry.
With the launch of the International Petroleum Research Directory in CD format, PSTI in collaboration with Longman are establishing an IPRD User Group. The first meeting will be held at Longman's offices in Central London on the 6 October 1994.
The objectives of the meeting are to receive feedback on the IPRD and its use from Member Companies and discuss its future development.
For further information, contact Mr Colin Sanderson at PSTI, Aberdeen.
A project to investigate the merits of measuring continuously the source signature in marine seismic exploration funded by PSTI and Total Oil Marine plc has been completed successfully. Conducted by Professor Anton Ziolkowski and colleagues in the Predictive Geoscience Unit, University of Edinburgh, the study used part of a new seismic survey obtained in October 1992 in co-operation with Seismograph Services Limited from the Inner Moray Firth area of the North Sea. Seismic data were obtained with the source wavefield measured using a number of near-field hydrophones.
Seismic data were processed to stack and migrated after stack, taking knowledge of the source wavefield into account in the signature deconvolution.
A particular bonus of the methodology was that extremely good well ties were obtained. The seismic data also give enhanced precision in the determination of Jurassic unco-formities, notably in the area of Block 12/22.
These methods open up possibilities for using seismic data to resolve hitherto undetected stratigraphic traps in the North Sea and other marine hyrdocarbon provinces.
Further information is available from PSTI, or directly from Professor Ziolkowski (Tel.:- 031 650 8516).
PSTI Member company PGS Reservoir Services AS has launched a proposal to conduct a seismic acquisition experiment using innovative sea-bed geophone technology. The experiment, first discussed earlier this year at a PSTI Geophysics Technical Interest Group meeting, will be conducted in association with the Defence Research Agency, Birkbeck College and Imperial College.
Site selection and technical discussions with interested companies are well advanced. For more information contact Dr Stewart Brown, PSTI, Edinburgh or Mr T-A Haugland of PGS directly (Tel.:- 010 47 675 26400).
The PSTI/Shell funded PhD project on overpressure development in sedimentary basins (Project SG/92/10), conducted during 1990-93 under the supervision of Dr Richard Swarbrick at Durham University, has provided a strong foundation for a new, major joint industry-funded research project Overpressures in North Sea HP/HT Reservoirs led by Dr Swarbrick. The project has received commitment from Amerada Hess Ltd, Amoco UK Exploration, EE Caledonia, Mobil North Sea Ltd, Phillips Petroleum Company, Statoil and Total Oil Marine plc, with the potential of additional funding from EPSRC through MTD Ltd. The project is also being considered by other oil companies.
The post-graduate project provided evidence in support of concepts and processes to be investigated further in the new JIP. PSTI's Technical Interest Group in Basin Analysis and Modelling provided Dr Swarbrick with an initial sounding board for his ideas for additional research. PSTI also helped initially in building the cross-disciplinary research group which will conduct the project; the Durham researchers are collaborating with the Newcastle University Research Group in Fossil Fuels and Environmental Geochemistry and the Department of Petroleum Engineering at Heriot-Watt University.
A three year joint industry funded project on engineered depressurisation of waterflooded reservoirs is being monitored by PSTI under assignment from the DTI Oil and Gas Division. The research is being conducted jointly by AEA Technology, Heriot-Watt University - Department of Petroleum Engineering and Imperial College - Reservoir Physics Group.
As well as the DTI, the project has industry support from BP Exploration Ltd, Elf Exploration plc, Enterprise Oil plc, Marathon Oil (UK) Ltd, Mobil North Sea Ltd, Shell UK Exploration and Production, Statoil and Total Oil Marine plc. This project has been initiated to focus combined UK expertise in IOR research towards the requirements for depressurisation. The project builds, in part, on results from earlier PSTI Membership-funded research conducted at Imperial College by Mr R. Hawes on 'The effect of solution gas in waterflooded reservoirs' (Project SE/92/20) and at Heriot-Watt University by Professor K. Sorbie on 'Microsopic modelling of relative permeability in systems containing three phases' (Project SE/92/23).
The project objectives are to provide data and calculation procedures which can be used to evaluate depressurisation applications in UK fields; to undertake a number of depressurisation experiments at reservoirs conditions using core materials and fluids taken from UKCS reservoirs; and to evaluate the effectiveness of existing reservoir simulation for predicting the performance of depressurisation field projects.
PSTI, in collaboration with Scottish Enterprise National, have commissioned a direct INTERNET access point on the Aberdeen Offshore Technology Park. The objective is to aid oil industry communication and information exchange.
PSTI plans to set up a service on INTERNET to disseminate information on research and technology as well as using it to facilitate the gathering and analysis of information available on international R&D activity.
At the last meeting of the Steering Committee for the European Network for Research in Geo-Energy (ENeRG) hosted by OMV in Vienna during the EAEG/EAPG Meeting in June, members agreed to share information on intentions with regard to research, development and demonstration proposals planned for submission to the European Union's 4th Framework Programme.
This will avoid unnecessary duplication of effort by the various research groups and will facilitate trans-national co-ordiation and collaboration. ENeRG members also decided to offer assistance to other researchers looking to build collaborative links for the purposes of submitting proposals for EU funding. ENeRG's membership was enlarged recently when FORBAIRT, the Dublin-based agency responsible for supporting Irish industry, joined the Network.
PSTI is the Presiding Member of ENeRG in 1994. For more information on ENeRG activities contact Dr Stewart Brown, PSTI, Edinburgh.
PSTI and the Marine Technology Directorate Limited have been working closely together during 1994 to build a research programme targeting high pressure/high temperature production issues. It is anticipated that the initiative will receive financial support via MTD from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council.
A call for research proposals earlier this year resulted in 22 submissions from 12 research groups spanning the fields of geoscience and engineering. Initial evaluation of the proposals has been conducted by members of PSTI's HP/HT Technical Interest Group. The final shape of the full programme which will run for three years will be known in the next two months. As a further move to co-ordinate the activities of the two organisations and to improve communication, Mr Don Lennard, Managing Director of MTD Ltd attended the recent meeting of the PSTI Science Advisory Committee (SAC), contributing to discussions on the future role of PSTI's Technical Interest Groups.
In a reciprocal move aimed at extending collaboration on research. Dr Stewart Brown of PSTI has been appointed to MTD's Technical Advisory Committee (TAC) and Mr Ian Brown of MTD has joined the Institute's SAC.
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