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Unconventional resources have propelled the United States to the top of the world’s energy producers, and the downturn is just another opportunity to figure out how to keep getting better.
There’s little that’s conventional about this year’s UnconventionalResources Technology Conference URTeC), slated this year for a newlocation and boasting a technical program that is cutting edge in content and expertise. URTeC 2015 will be held July 20-22 at the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center in San Antonio.
With the recent surge in new techniques and technology, as well as new plays put into production, a tremendous opportunity exists in both U.S. and international reservoirs to apply lessons learned to existing reservoirs in order to economically increase production and recoverable reserves.
Are current conditions in oil and gas creating a big opportunity for petroleum geologists in the Rocky Mountain region? Some experts say today’s drilling slowdown gives geologists time to catch up on recent advances in science, providing a less hectic opportunity to analyze data, study reservoirs and create improved models.
On the heels of an April 23 article in The New York Times headlined, “A New ‘OPEC’ Emerges: The U.S.,” this year’s Unconventional Resources Technology Conference (URTeC) will take that topic into the field, tracking the country’s shale boom from its inception to turning the United States into the world’s No. 1 petroleum and natural gas producer in 2014 – overtaking Saudi Arabia and Russia.
This year's AAPG Woodford Shale Forum focused on new information and optimization. Included were presenters from the University of Oklahoma, Halliburton, Black Swan Energy Services, and Devon Energy just to name a few.
The technical program is in place for the third annual Unconventional Resources Technology Conference (URTeC), which will be held July 20-22 at the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center in San Antonio, and there’s still time to save $100 by registering before June 8.
Action is ongoing in the late Ordovician-age Utica shale play in the northeastern United States, despite the drilling pullback in shale plays overall owing to the global downturn in crude oil prices.
When the initial Discovery Thinking forum debuted in San Antonio at the 2008 AAPG Annual Convention and Exhibition, it garnered high marks from attendees. Still, who could have known that this initial forum would be the harbinger of such an amazingly successful and long-running program?
AAPG bestows the Robert R. Berg Award in recognition of a singular achievement in petroleum geoscience research. Mark Zoback’s research has advanced the industry’s understanding and application of geomechanics, but he’s also done important work in other areas.
Production from unconventional petroleum reservoirs includes petroleum from shale, coal, tight-sand and oil-sand. These reservoirs contain enormous quantities of oil and natural gas but pose a technology challenge to both geoscientists and engineers to produce economically on a commercial scale. These reservoirs store large volumes and are widely distributed at different stratigraphic levels and basin types, offering long-term potential for energy supply. Most of these reservoirs are low permeability and porosity that need enhancement with hydraulic fracture stimulation to maximize fluid drainage. Production from these reservoirs is increasing with continued advancement in geological characterization techniques and technology for well drilling, logging, and completion with drainage enhancement. Currently, Australia, Argentina, Canada, Egypt, USA, and Venezuela are producing natural gas from low permeability reservoirs: tight-sand, shale, and coal (CBM). Canada, Russia, USA, and Venezuela are producing heavy oil from oilsand. USA is leading the development of techniques for exploring, and technology for exploiting unconventional gas resources, which can help to develop potential gas-bearing shales of Thailand. The main focus is on source-reservoir-seal shale petroleum plays. In these tight rocks petroleum resides in the micro-pores as well as adsorbed on and in the organics. Shale has very low matrix permeability (nano-darcies) and has highly layered formations with differences in vertical and horizontal properties, vertically non-homogeneous and horizontally anisotropic with complicate natural fractures. Understanding the rocks is critical in selecting fluid drainage enhancement mechanisms; rock properties such as where shale is clay or silica rich, clay types and maturation , kerogen type and maturation, permeability, porosity, and saturation. Most of these plays require horizontal development with large numbers of wells that require an understanding of formation structure, setting and reservoir character and its lateral extension. The quality of shale-gas resources depend on thickness of net pay (>100 m), adequate porosity (>2%), high reservoir pressure (ideally overpressure), high thermal maturity (>1.5% Ro), high organic richness (>2% TOC), low in clay (<50%), high in brittle minerals (quartz, carbonates, feldspars), and favourable in-situ stress. During the past decade, unconventional shale and tight-sand gas plays have become an important supply of natural gas in the US, and now in shale oil as well. As a consequence, interest to assess and explore these plays is rapidly spreading worldwide. The high production potential of shale petroleum resources has contributed to a comparably favourable outlook for increased future petroleum supplies globally. Application of 2D and 3D seismic for defining reservoirs and micro seismic for monitoring fracturing, measuring rock properties downhole (borehole imaging) and in laboratory (mineralogy, porosity, permeability), horizontal drilling (downhole GPS), and hydraulic fracture stimulation (cross-linked gel, slick-water, nitrogen or nitrogen foam) is key in improving production from these huge resources with low productivity factors.
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