Operational reliability management of petroleum reservoirs

Microbial diversity in petroleum reservoirs

Buried hydrocarbon deposits, such as liquid petroleum, represent an abundant source of reduced carbon for microbes. It is not surprising therefore that many organisms have adapted to an oily, anaerobic life deep underground, often at high temperatures and pressures, and that those organisms have had, and in some cases continue to have, an effect on the quality and recovery of the earth’s dimini...

On the simulation of heterogeneous petroleum reservoirs

Quantification of uncertainty for fluid flow in heterogeneous petroleum reservoirs

Detailed description of the heterogeneity of oil/gas reservoirs is needed to make performance predictions of oil/gas recovery. However, only limited measurements at a few locations are usually available. This combination of significant spatial heterogeneity with incomplete information about it leads to uncertainty about the values of reservoir properties and thus, to uncertainty in estimates of...

Estimation of absolute and relative permeabilities in petroleum reservoirs

The estimation of absolute and relative permeabilities for petroleum reservoirs on the basis of noisy data at wells is considered. The spatially varying absolute permeability is estimated by regularisation combined with a bi-cubic spline approximation. Relative permeability is represented by a given function of saturation with unknown coefficients. Numerical results provide an indication of the...

Radiotracer Assay of Microbial Processes in Petroleum Reservoirs

Oilfield microbial communities exist under conditions of hampered exchange of water and mass and at a constant temperature; they are independent of the modern atmosphere and sunlight and may be considered closed or semi-closed systems. Crude oil is the main source of organic matter in this ecosystem. Microbial growth in reservoirs can be limited by the low content of phosphate and ammonium nutr...