GOM³ News - October 2012

Final Call for the 7th Annual User Conference!
October 17, 2012 - Anadarko's offices, The Woodlands, TX

To attend the conference, click here for free registration.

Conference Agenda (all times AM)

8:30 - 9:00	Arrival/Check-In
9:00 - 9:15	Introduction - John Grace, ESA
9:15 - 9:35	GOM3 Additions of the Past Year - Tony Dupont, ESA. Show/hide details
	A detailed look at some of the enhancements to the software and data since last year's user conference.
9:35 - 10:05	Geostatistical Estimation of the Gulf of Mexico Pore Pressure Field - John Grace, ESA. Show/hide details
	This summer, ESA entered a cooperative program at California State University, Fullerton to provide instruction, data and research guidance for six students completing their Masters of Applied Mathematics. Our goal was to geostatistically estimate the pore pressure field for the central and western GOM. From GOM3, we provided two critical data sets: 1) From the Well Activity Report layer (under Map Layers -> Wells), 48,507 observations on mud weight and depth. 2) From the Sands layer (under Map Layers -> Hydrocarbon Accumulations), 13,506 observations on initial reservoir pressure and reservoir depth. The two variables were analyzed separately but both were divided into 21 depth cohorts: from 0-500 feet below mean sea level, then by 1,000-foot intervals to 19,500-20,500 feet. For each depth interval, ordinary kriging was applied to estimate and map the mean mud weight and reservoir pressure for that interval across the Gulf. For each map of estimated mean, a separate map of kriging standard error (KSE) was also produced. Including the KSE maps with the mean mud weight and reservoir pressure for each 1,000-foot interval allows users to quantitatively assess the confidence they should invest in the statistically estimated means. It also enhances understanding of the natural lateral variability of the pore pressure field across the Gulf within any single 1,000-foot depth interval. Based on the predicted means at 1,000-foot intervals, additional analysis explored changes in both pressure gradient and mud weight with depth. This identified areas where the pressure gradient changes anomalously with increasing depth: either it increases at a rate greater than the hydrostatic gradient - or actually reverses and goes down between one 1,000-foot depth interval and the next deepest interval. Both conditions can present significant drilling hazards and influence the local distribution of hydrocarbons. Between certain depth intervals, we mapped several contiguous areas with either anomalously high rates of increasing pressure or pressure reversals. The six students completed their project and graduated in August. We are now revising the final report for publication with the assistance of several experts from our client-companies. By year-end, all final mean mud weight and reservoir pressure maps, along with their corresponding KSE maps, will be placed in GOM3 to provide users with a new source of analysis of pore pressure throughout the Gulf.
10:05 - 10:20	GOM3: an essential tool for Galvez Energy's business strategy in the Gulf of Mexico - Bill Enyart, Galvez. Show/hide details
	GOM3's benefits to Galvez include: Investor Presentations - Illustrating the value of exploration in our trend (Texas shelf) - Analyzing distribution, value of historical and current production in proximity to our 70 block Galveston Area Survey - Infrastructure in presentations - pipelines, wells etc Work Program - Mapping various production trends in target age lithology (Upper/Mid/Lower Miocene) - Downloading wells logs Lease Sale - Analyzing historical bid information Prospect Marketing - Following drilling activity - who is drilling, are they a sales target? - Analyze production information at our analog - extrapolate to our prospect (realization of liquids had huge impact on value of our prospect) - Production charts at analog - Generate Plats for CA's
10:20 - 10:35	Break
10:35 - 10:55	The GOM3 Outlook - Tony Dupont, ESA. Show/hide details
	Looking forward to future developments of GOM3, both short term and long term, particularly plans to take advantage of features of ArcGIS 10 and modifications for web-services and mobile devices.
10:55 - 11:25	Decline Curve Tool for GOM3 and ESA's Forgotten Oil & Gas Study - John Grace, ESA. Show/hide details
	This year, we undertook a major project directed at two innovations. We will soon add a tool to GOM3 and GOMsmart to perform decline curve analysis on any completion and completion-interval in the Gulf. The tool will automatically analyze oil, gas and water data then forecast future production to a user-specified abandonment flow rate, pressure or water cut. It will also estimate the remaining oil and gas between the last recorded production and abandonment. The tool automatically applies three regression models to both oil and gas data: an exponential fit of production rate versus months on-line (i.e., time), a hyperbolic fit of production rate versus months on-line and a linear fit of production rate versus cumulative production. For gas completions only, we also fit (where sufficient test data is available) corrected pressure (P/Z) versus cumulative production. The results include a recommendation of which model provides the best statistical fit; hence, represents the highest-confidence forecast of future production and remaining producible hydrocarbons. Estimated 10/90 (i.e., 80%) confidence intervals are included with all forecasts. The monthly production data, forecasted production, remaining potential, confidence intervals and statistical analysis can all be downloaded to Excel. Our second project goal was to run the new decline curve tool in batch mode, individually estimating the remaining hydrocarbons of all ~60,000 completions that ever produced in the Gulf. This is the core of our Forgotten Oil and Gas study. In it, we are integrating the decline curve analysis with other data sources (e.g., sand and field reserve histories, the indicated hydrocarbon list and ESA's prospect and discovery data) to high-grade opportunities and facilitate exploitation of "forgotten" oil and gas in producing or depleted reservoirs and fields. Beyond decline curve results, we are applying new mathematical techniques to forecast production, particularly where there is a short production history.
11:25 - 11:55	User Feedback Forum - moderated by Tony Dupont, ESA. Show/hide details
	This is the critical time of every conference where everyone can join us in formulating the future of GOM3 development. So many of the continuous additions to GOM3 come from user input and this is the best opportunity to give us direction. ESA remains committed to directly enhancing GOM3 based on your feedback.

Come see what's new and upcoming:

Positions Storm Radii (in knots)

Displaying storms in August 2012 using ArcMap's temporal features.

Because of changes to the file names for past lease owners, a new installation is required. If you have not received a link to this installation, please contact Tony Dupont at tony@earthsci.com.
ArcGIS 10 toolbars change with the new AddIn--no installation required.

For a list of past newsletters, click here.