The following courses are currently available. Click on title below to view course outline, or select other option from menu on right side:
Introduction to Petroleum Exploration (1 Day)
Introduction to Petroleum Drilling (1 Day)
Fundamentals of Petroleum Drilling (2 Days)
Fundamentals of Petroleum Geology For Non-Geologists (2 Days)
Fundamentals of Seismic For Non-Geophysicists (2 Days)
Introduction to Petroleum Exploration (1 Day)
Target audience
The course is designed for personnel who work in the exploration industry but have little or no exploration-specific technical background. This includes administration staff, technical support staff, and those in management or professional roles whose background is in a field other than Earth Science.
Course objectives
The course provides an overview of the business of petroleum exploration from acreage selection through to final discovery of an oil or gas field. It highlights the multi-disciplinary nature of the business, examines the tools and methods used in exploration, and provides an understanding of the technical terminology.
Course outline
Participants will be exposed to the basic concepts of acreage management, exploration geology, petroleum geophysics, rotary drilling, and economics and risk assessment:
Acreage acquisition and legal aspects
- How exploration groups are put together (joint ventures, floats, operators, non-operators)
- How companies acquire exploration acreage (permits, gazettals, open acreage, bidding, work programs, farmins, joint ventures)
- Legal obligations and moral responsibilities (legislation, environmental controls)
Petroleum geology
- Why companies explore where they do (rock types and properties, geological models, prospectivity)
- Where oil and gas come from (source, seal, reservoir, generation, migration, trapping mechanisms)
- How oil and gas fields are found (basin analysis, regional studies, play concepts, prospect generation)
Petroleum geophysics
- How explorers determine what it looks like below the surface of the earth (remote sensing)
- How seismic works (acquisition, processing, 2D and 3D surveys)
- What seismic tells us (interpretation, mapping, hydrocarbon indicators)
Exploration drilling
- Types of drilling rigs (land rigs, jackups, drill ships, semi-submersibles)
- How rotary wells are drilled (hoisting, rotating, circulation, control)
- Information obtained from wells (cuttings, cores, logs, well seismic)
- What happens after the well is drilled (abandon, suspend, test)
Economics and risk
- Why do we drill so many dry holes (outcomes, prospect risking and ranking)
- Differences between technical success and commercial success (costs, prices, infrastructure)
- How do we handle the risks involved (geological risk - POS, commercial risk – EMV)
- The “Exploration Game” An fun opportunity to draw the learnings of the day together
Return to top
Introduction to Petroleum Drilling (1 Day)
Target audience
The course is designed for personnel who work in the exploration industry but have little or no exploration-specific technical background. This includes administration staff, technical support staff, and those in management or professional roles whose background is in a field other than Earth Science.
The Drilling course is an ideal follow-up for those who have previously attended the Basic Exploration Short Course and would like a more detailed understanding of the drilling process. However, that is not a pre-requisite as both courses are entirely self-contained.
Course objectives
The drilling of an oil well is seen as the culmination of the exploration process, but to the lay person it is a mysterious and complex undertaking which has a language all of its own. This course highlights the multi-disciplinary nature of the business, examines the tools and methods used in exploration drilling, and provides an understanding of the technical terminology and jargon used.
Course outline
Rules and regulations
- The historical record and current activity levels
- Who controls the drilling process; safety and environmental constraints
- Reporting requirements – how to read a drilling report
Pre-drill preparations
- How companies select a drilling location
- Rig types and selection
- Well planning, procedures and costs
Drilling the well
- Components of a rig – hoisting, circulating, rotating and control systems
- The mechanics of making hole
- Special techniques – deviated and horizontal drilling
Evaluating the well
- Cuttings and core analysis
- Oil and gas shows, sampling, testing
- Basic wireline logs, measurement while drilling
- What it all means – interpreting the results
What can go wrong
- Kicks, blowouts and oil spills
- Loss of hole, loss of equipment and fishing
- Completion and abandonment
- The “Drilling Game” – just for fun: drill a well and gain an appreciation of some of the risks involved
Return to top
Fundamentals of Drilling (2 Days)
Target audience
Although this drilling course requires no pior knowledge, it provdes a more in-depth look at drilling than the one-day course so is more suited to personnel who work in a drilling related area such as purchasing, contracting, accounting, reporting type roles directly associated with drilling operations.
Course objectives
This course examines the tools and methods used in exploration drilling, provides an understanding of the technical terminology and jargon used, and also examines sources of error and uncertainty which might lead to costly problems.
Course outline
Overview of drilling activities
- The historical record and current worldwide activity levels
- Rules and regulations
- Who controls the drilling process; safety and environmental constraints
- Reporting requirements
- EXERCISE: Decoding a drilling report
Pre-drill preparations
- Selecting a drilling location
- Rig types and characteristics
- Well planning, procedures and budgets
- EXERCISE: Constructing a time-depth well prognosis
- EXERCISE: Budgeting a well
Drilling the well
- Components of a rig – hoisting, circulating, rotating and control systems
- The mechanics of making hole
- Special techniques - deviated and horizontal drilling
- CASE STUDY: Intercepting a deviated wellbore
Evaluating the well
- Sources and reliability of well data
- Mudlogging and coring
- Oil and gas show analysis
- Wireline logging
- Measurement While Drilling
- Flow testing
- EXERCISE: Reading wellsite reports
- EXERCISE: Working with well logs
Completing the well
- Well abandonment
- Completion for production
Drilling problems and remedies
- Kicks, blowouts and oil spills
- Loss of hole, loss of equipment and fishing
- Workover and intervention techniques
- CASE HISTORY: Repairing damaged well
Fundamentals of Oil & Gas Production
- Types and characteristics of reservoir drive mechanisms
- Field development concepts
Concepts of reserves
- Categorisation of reserves and resources
- Definitions: technical, proven, probable and possible
- Approaches to reserves estimation: deterministic versus probabilistic
- Measures of profitability: NPV and EMV
- EXERCISE: Beans, beans and more beans! – Illustrating uncertainty
- EXERCISE: Understanding press releases
Return to top
Fundamentals of Petroleum Geology For Non-Geologists (2 Days)
Target audience
This course is designed for people who need to communicate or work with geologists on a regular basis, such as petroleum engineers and geophysicists. It is also useful for project managers who have geoscientists in their team but do not have a geological background themselves.
Course objectives
The course examines the tools and methods used by the petoleum geologist and provides an understanding of the technical terminology and jargon used. It also examines sources of error and uncertainty which might lead to costly problems.
Outline of course
Occurrence, distribution, and nature of petroleum
- History of petroleum exploitation
- Worldwide distribution of petroleum
- Essential characteristics of Oil and Gas
Basic rock forming processes
- Classification and origin of rocks
- Burial, lithification and diagenesis
Geological time and dating geological events
- How rocks are dated (absolute and relative time)
- Importance of time in rock formation and deformation
- Lithostratigraphy and chronostratigraphy
- EXERCISE: Dating and sequencing structural and stratigraphic events
- EXERCISE: Understanding a stratigraphic column
Fundamentals of maps and sections
- Concepts of strike and dip
- Isochores and isopachs
- Key characteristics of maps and sections
- Mapping structure and stratigraphy
- EXERCISE: Construction of simple maps and sections
Characteristics of petroleum accumulations
- Nature and origin of traps, source, seals and reservoirs
- Structural and stratigraphic traps
- Petroleum systems
- EXERCISE: Generating leads and prospects
Sedimentary depositional environments
- Types and origins of sedimentary rocks (clastics and carbonates)
- Major depositional environments and their importance to exploration
- Characteristics and distribution of source rocks, reservoirs and seals
- Facies mapping and palaeogeography
- EXERCISE: Application of palaeogeographic principles to exploration
The process of petroleum exploration
- Basin, play and prospect analysis
- Remote sensing and the basics of seismology
- Generating and evaluating prospects
- EXERCISE: Converting seismic sections from time to depth
- EXERCISE: The ‘Exploration Game’
Geological information from wells
- Brief overview of drilling and well completion procedures
- Sources and reliability of well data (mud logging, well logging, testing)
- Role of the well-site geologist
- Coring and core analysis
- Working with well logs
- EXERCISE: Reading and understanding a geological report
- EXERCISE: Simple well log analysis and correlation
Fundamentals of production geology
- Role of the production geologist
- Sources and reliability of information
- Reservoir geology and approaches to reservoir modeling
- EXERCISE: Multiple map manipulation
Field development concepts
- Reducing uncertainty through appraisal drilling
- Key features of producing reservoirs
- Leakage: spill points, vertical and lateral seals
- Identifying contacts and fluid levels
- Horizontal and multi-lateral completions
- CASE STUDY: Review a field development program
Reservoir drive mechanisms
- Types and characteristics of drive mechanisms
- Enhanced oil recovery
- Well intervention and workovers
Concepts of reserves
- Definitions: technical, proven, probable and possible
- Approaches to reserves estimation
- CASE STUDY: Interpreting press releases -
- EXERCISE: Beans, beans and more beans! – illustrating uncertainty
Return to top
Fundamentals of Seismic For Non-Geophysicists (2 Days)
Target Audience
This course will greatly benefit anyone who needs to communicate more effectively with petroleum geophysicists and to better understand geophysical maps, sections and analyses for exploration, development and reserves estimation, such as:
- Geologists with limited geophysics training or background
- Managers, contracts administrators, and technical support personnel who need to understand seismic jargon
- Supervisors and managers who want to communicate better with their team geophysicists
- Supply chain and support personnel who would like to more effectively support their seismic field crews
- Reservoir engineers who regularly liaise with geophysicists and/or work with seismic maps and other geophysical inputs
Course Objectives
The course provides a fundamental understanding and overview of the petroleum industry’s seismic method for personnel who come into contact with seismic during their work but have little or no background in this area. It is pitched at a basic awareness level so that participants will be able to understand key concepts, applications and terminology associated with the acquisition, processing and interpretation of seismic data. The course is non-mathematical and includes talks, discussions, video footage, demonstrations, hands-on exercises, and case studies. Jargon is kept to a minimum and technical terms are clearly explained.
Participants will gain an understanding of the strengths and limitations of the seismic method, costs and risks involved, the meaning of seismic maps and sections and an overview of the latest developments in seismic technology.
Outline of Course
INTRODUCTORY PRINCIPLES
Introduction to the seismic method
- What is seismic, overview of the process
- Different types of seismic: 2D, 3D, 4D, 4C,
- How and where can it be acquired
- Role, cost and value of seismic in the E&P cycle
Fundamental Seismic Principles
- Modes of sound energy propagation
- Wavefronts and raypaths
- Compressional and shear waves
- Where do the reflections come from?
- Acoustic impedance and reflection coefficients
- Interval and average velocities
- Characteristics of the seismic wavelet
- Amplitude, bandwidth and phase
- Data limitations: vertical and lateral resolution
- Exercise: How small can we see?
Characteristics of Seismic Sections
- Types of displays and scales
- Shotpoints, CDPs and traces
- Inlines and crosslines
- Time slices
- Chair displays
- Exercise: Seismic sections and noise
SEISMIC ACQUISITION
The survey design process
- Geometry, stack and fold
- Offend and split spread layout
Acquisition equipment - onshore and offshore
Energy Sources
- Desired source qualities
- Conventional sources
- Unconventional sources
Receivers
- Desired receiver qualities
- Geophones and hydrophones
- Receiver arrays
Ancillary equipment
Field operations - Onshore and offshore
- 2D, 3D, 4D, HD3D, OBC, VC, MAZ, WAZ
Limitations on seismic imaging
- Cost issues
- Types and sources of noise
- Case study: Planning a seismic program
SEISMIC DATA PROCESSING (without the maths)
Key objectives of processing
Basic processing computations: stacking, convolution, imaging
Understanding the key elements of a processing sequence
- Pre-stack processing
- Geometry and stacking charts
- Amplitudes in time and offset
- Primary reflections and multiples
- Deconvolution
- Normal Moveout
- First breaks and Statics
- Gathers and stacking
- Velocity analysis
- Post-stack processing
- Migration – Pre- and post-stack
- Filtering and scaling
- Attribute processing
- Case histories and data examples
- Simple graphical exercises related to: stacking, NMO, convolution, migration
SEISMIC INTERPRETATION
Fundamental Principles
- What is seismic character?
- What can we see: chronostratigraphy, lithostratigraphy, DHIs
- The role of models in interpretation
- Structural interpretation
- Tieing wells to seismic data
- Time to depth conversion
- Seismostratigraphic interpretation
Interpretation exercises
- Well tie to seismic section
- Simple structural interpretation
- Simple seismostratigraphic interpretation
- Simple depth conversion study
Return to top
|
