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A list of very useful Production Geology links. Please reply and suggest additions.

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by Mike Shepherd

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I've written a book for the AAPG on Oil Field Production Geology. I have a website that goes with the book on http://www.productiongeology.com , mainly commenting on new ideas that aren't in the book.

The book and the website focuses on the more pragmatic aspects of the subject. I wrote the book with the idea that a new start in an oil company, given a field to look after, could get an idea of what to do with it. I've tried to write it in a simple, lucid fashion and I concentrate on explaining the basics without any fuss. Hopefully, geologists and other disciplines will find it useful.

Mike,

Thanks for joining the forums. I imagine your insights and ideas will be more than welcome here!
I also added the link to your website!

Mike,

can you give us any indication of when your new version of OIL FIELD PRODUCTION GEOLOGY can be expected?

I'm not intending to update the book at the moment. I'm involved in a campaign to stop the development of a public park in the centre of Aberdeen, Scotland and this is taking up all my spare time! If anyone thinks the book should be updated any suggestions on how to improve it will be welcome.

Mike,

I don't have your book, but I had a look at your website and was particularly interested in the "missing work flow" in 3D static modeling. I work with Petrel a lot and acknowledge the problem. Re-assessing a static model after production data slowly starts pointing towards discrepancies with the forward model is too often neglected.

What do you propose in terms of this. I would love to read your views!

... and is this tackled in the 2009 version or are these ideas that still need publishing, seeing they are under "Ideas from 2009/10".

Petrel user,

Thanks for your interest. Yes there are several chapters in the book on understanding a mature field in terms of how the geology influences flow paths. Once you understand this then there is a better chance of locating the remaining oil pockets. These methods are commonly used for example, by the Texas-based Bureau of Economic Geology, Shell, Statoil and in China. If you find the recent paper Gill and Shepherd on the Nelson field, this provides a case history where the methods have been applied.

In terms of reservoir modelling, I mention in the book that it is possible to produce a reasonable geological model for a reservoir (e.g. in Petrel) but it still doesn't reflect how the field works. You can come up with a plausible geological model, get the facies proportions, geometric shapes, facies relationships and properties OK, yet hidden and quirky local features can often dominate the flow patterns in a reservoir; often features that are not obvious until you start integrating the production data.

In the book I suggest that a module for data integration should be provided for 3D geological modelling packages. I reckon this could cause a step change in improved field recovery world-wide. However, I've failed to interest the two companies I've contacted on the issue. There is still a blind spot amongst many reservoir geologists that integrating production data is the reservoir engineers job.

Yes that's in the book too! Simple reservoir engineering analysis can provide a feedback loop to the geologist to help them understand what's talking to what. BP take this to the next level of sophistication with their top-down reservoir modelling workflow.

However, there are lots of simple tricks in the toolbag to help the geologist understand how the plumbing works. I explain the ones I know about. I actually reckon that trying to figure out how a reservoir works in this way is the most satisfying job a geologist can do. It's detective work. Unfortunately not every production geologist knows how to do this.

Mike,

thanks for your response. I'll be sure to enter your book in our quarterly literature requests as it doesn't seem to be in the library. Are you yourself a petrel user? and... are you still in the business?