Computing the Recovery Code
-
September 12, 2013
The scientific complexity of recovering oil and gas continues to grow as the “easy” hydrocarbons have been depleted. With millions of dollars at stake for each well drilled, it is critical companies receive strong intelligence from a technical perspective in order to optimize prediction and planning.
Enter The University of Texas at Austin Department of Petroleum and Geosystems Engineering (UT PGE) Professor Kamy Sepehrnoori, who has been with UT PGE for more than 30 years and has dedicated his career to improving the recovery prediction for oil and gas reservoirs through the development of simulators.
Dr. Kamy Sepehrnoori and Graduate Student Mahdi Haddad
Recognized as a world leader in this area of petroleum engineering, Sepehrnoori contributes his success to his multidisciplinary background. He received his undergraduate degree in mechanical engineering and then switched to aerospace engineering for his master’s degree. After studying elements above the earth, he began researching what lies below the earth’s surface in UT PGE’s PhD program.
After obtaining an assistant professor position in UT PGE, Sepehrnoori spent the last three decades developing reservoir simulators to assist engineers’ decision-making and planning for maximum hydrocarbon recovery.
“Reservoirs are incredibly complex, so mathematical modeling is essential for predicting the production of resources,” said Sepehrnoori. “These are not problems that can be solved by hand.”
Sephernoori’s research is not focused on one area; he creates models for a variety of recovery processes and all his research works together to help discover new ideas. Sepehrnoori bases his research on the trends occurring in the oil and gas sector to meet our country’s energy demands.
“With the natural gas boom spreading throughout the U.S., my research group is focusing on simulation of unconventional resources such as shale gas and tight oil reservoirs,” said Sepehrnoori. “We are looking for methods to enhance the recovery from low permeability formations.”
Due to the importance of production from shale gas and tight oil reservoirs, three of Sepehrnoori’s PhD students’ dissertation research is devoted to this area.
Sephernoori’s graduate student, third-year PhD candidate Wei Yu, is currently working on a project to address the industry’s growing demands for solutions to optimize hydraulic fracturing in an environment where the price of natural gas remains fairly low.
“There is a high cost and uncertainty with hydraulic fracturing due to unpredictable parameters including permeability, porosity and fracture spacing,” said Yu. “My research focuses on developing a user-friendly and efficient simulation framework to obtain the optimal hydraulic fracturing design for shale gas and tight oil production.”
Yu plans on completing the game-changing framework in the next year or two as part of his dissertation.
“My end goal is to provide industry with the best recovery scenario by reducing uncertainty,” said Yu.
In order for Yu to successfully complete his research, he looks to another one of Sepehrnoori’s PhD students, Mahdi Haddad, for configuration and conductivity of optimized hydraulic fractures.
“There are a lot of pieces to the hydraulic fracturing puzzle,” said Haddad. “I’m collaborating with Wei to offer a comprehensive package to industry including a 3D hydraulic fracturing model and an optimizing tool.”
When Sepehrnoori is not supervising one of the largest research groups in the world in the area of reservoir simulation development and application or teaching in a classroom, he serves as the graduate advisor and an influential member of the Graduate Studies Committee. He strongly believes in the benefits of a diverse population of graduate students and travels all over the world to promote the program.
Learn more about Sepehrnoori’s research program, including his current projects, by visiting his dedicated page on the CPGE website.
