Students at West Virgina University (WVU) will now have the opportunity to study geology and engineering using real-life programs thanks to a $6.4-million software donation from Petroleum Experts Ltd. (Petex), a petroleum engineering and structural geology company. The software suite consists of eight programs used by oil and gas professionals.
The software will be used in four undergraduate and graduate courses focused on structural geology for energy extraction, geomechanics for petroleum and geothermal systems, 3D subsurface methods, and reservoir brittleness for energy storage, according to WVU. The program is designed to “involve the elimination of artificial boundary conditions that would be imposed by individual disciplines and facilitate the construction of models that would behave as close to reality as possible,” Petex said.
“Students and faculty also make extended use of Petex software for interdisciplinary educational and collaborative research between geology and petroleum and natural gas engineering to better achieve WVU goals of program learning outcomes,” Brent McCusker, professor of geography and chair of the Eberly College Department of Geology and Geography, said in a press release. “Continued efforts in these areas remain crucial in increasing our student credit hour production and research impact in the areas of energy and sustainability.”
Earlier this year, Petex also donated the software to students at Montana Technological University.