Guarav Bhatnagar, a doctoral student at Rice U.; Lisa Stright, a graduate student at Stanford U.; and Krystina Vidiuk, an undergraduate student at the U. of Alberta won first place in their respective divisions at the 2006 International Student Paper Contest. The contest was held during the 2006 SPE Annual Technical Conference and Exhibition in San Antonio.
Bhatnagar’s project developed contour plots that are relatively insensitive to changes in seafloor depth, temperature, and geothermal gradient. Their high quality makes the plots ideal base cases for providing quantitative information about the possible types of hydrate accumulation at any given location without performing any numerical simulations.
Stright developed a methodology in which shale drapes are upscaled accurately and history matched to production data while maintaining the geological concept that describes the drape geometry. Her coupled model of cell centers and cell edges enables more-flexible reservoir modeling, opening up the potential for modeling and history matching complex geological features effectively at the scale at which they are relevant, without additional computational cost of flow simulation.
Vidiuk used a compositional simulator to model the flow of a hydrogen sulfide gas front through aquifers that might be used for disposal of the gas. She found that parameters such as the absolute-permeability anisotropy ratio and location of well perforations have little effect on the quality of the model, but relative permeability and capillary pressure curves must be investigated more thoroughly to predict the outcome of the gas injection.
Undergraduate student paper contest winners.
Graduate student paper contest winners.
Doctorate student paper contest winners.