Technology Focus: Reserves/Asset Management (December 2013)
Authors: James Hinkle Delores 
Published: February 2015

Technology Focus

Members of SPE continue to share valuable and useful information through the more than 90 papers on reserves and asset management presented at various meetings, symposiums, and workshops this past year. Each and every paper presented has valuable content. The papers I selected represent a very small sampling of the topics associated with the varied issues around reserves estimation and asset management.  They were chosen to reflect the variety of topics in this category, with a balance between technical and practical papers, and to recognize the global nature of our industry.   

As with papers presented in 2012, approximately 10% of the papers from both categories addressed risk in some fashion. Reserves papers continue to focus on the analysis of reserves and resource volumes in unconventional and shale developments as well as estimating recovery from coalbeds. However, with the advancing understanding of estimation practices in these properties, many of the papers focused on practical application of previously presented concepts. The same is true for the regulatory aspect of reserves and resources. The publication of SPE’s Guidelines for Application of the PRMS in late 2011 reflects the maturation throughout the industry of the Petroleum Resources Management System (PRMS) that was developed in 2007. Other regulatory changes, such as the modernization of US Securities Exchange Commission rules in 2009, fostered papers on application of various regulatory and fiscal systems and global market forces.  

Asset-management papers continue to focus on integration of multiple factors to improve our understanding of the effect of various components of the production process. Most of the papers address modeling in some manner, with many presenting interesting field studies that demonstrate the practical application and value of the approach. As a reservoir engineer at heart, I find it indeed satisfying to see many of these papers include the importance of reservoir management alongside completion and facility management to truly optimize production and recovery.

Full-length versions of all papers summarized here are available to SPE members free for 2 months at www.jptonline.org. Anyone interested in investigating any topic relevant to reserves or asset management will find a wealth of useful information at www.onepetro.org, where all papers in the SPE library are available for purchase. Finally, I would like to personally encourage anyone who has developed work that might be useful to the society to consider writing a paper for presentation.

Recommended additional reading at OnePetro: www.onepetro.org.

SPE 159174 Quantifying Proved Undeveloped Reserves in the Woodford Shale: A Seamless Integration of Statistical Empirical and Analytical Techniques by Madhav M. Kulkarni, Marathon, et al.

SPE 162631 How to Apply Stretched Exponential Equations to Reserves Estimation by Randy Freeborn, Energy Navigator, et al.

SPE 164301 Building a Large-Scale Sustainable Integrated-Asset Model for Greater Burgan by J. Joslin, AAR Energy, et al.