Guest Editorial

There are numerous views of what the future energy landscape will look like in the next decade and beyond. When thinking about sources of primary energy, it is not a question of either/or, it is a question of what can reach scale fast enough to meet continued demand growth.

If design A yields the same 90-day production at 10% lower cost in a series of wells than design B wells, is design A the better one? Using pressure-based fracture measurements, the separability of variables between two completion designs can be evaluated.

Drilling rig automation is increasing as the industry realizes its benefits. What about downhole automation of the drilling process, specifically directional drilling? What problems might it solve and what opportunities might it create? The opportunity is huge, if only we look in the right place.

Carbon storage is perhaps the only viable option for reducing carbon to the levels that many governments have agreed are important, and EOR is the only proven technology that can be made ready in the time and at the scale required to accomplish this reduction worldwide.

While traditional operating expenses in produced water management are heavily scrutinized, a full picture of profitability in water management is gained only after comprehensively examining the unique aspects of the overall business model.