Ozkan

Executive Editors of SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering alternate writing the Executive Summary. This issue’s summary is by Erdal Ozkan.

With this issue, my term as the Executive Editor for the Reservoir Evaluation side of SPEREE has officially ended. Alan Johnson will take over and share the editorial responsibilities of the journal with Birol Dindoruk. Alan has served at every level of the Editorial Review Committee and knows the peer-review system very well; I am certain that he will make a great contribution to the quality of the journal. In my last editorial, I would like to share some statistical information with you and make some comments about the increasing research and development activities and their potential impact on SPE publications.

Every year, during the Annual Technical Conference and Exhibition, the Executive Editors of SPE’s technical journals present reports to their respective review committees. Because of the end of my term this year, I tried to take a detailed look at the statistics. For the last 2 years, the average number of papers that have been considered for publication in the reservoir evaluation side of the journal is approximately 180 per year. The average duration of the peer-review period from submission of the manuscript to final decision was approximately 400 days. Although this represents an improvement with respect to the average duration of the peer-review cycle before the full implementation of the online system 2 years ago, we probably would like to bring the review time to 6 months or less.

Checking a few respected journals in our discipline and other engineering branches, I have found that a 20 to 40% acceptance rate is about the average for technical publications. The average rate of acceptance for SPEREE during the last 2 years was less than 15%. The numbers put SPEREE among the most selective technical publications. However, the lower-than-average acceptance rate for SPEREE should not be taken as a result of an overly strict peer-review system. One of the contributing factors is the source of our paper intake. Most of our papers come from SPE meetings and conferences (the number of unsolicited papers is insignificant). The large number of conference papers with respect to the limited number of available journal pages contributes to the low acceptance rate. In addition, some of the conference papers are not intended for archival publication but still go through the peer-review process (a problem I addressed in my editorial for the April issue). Overall, however, having a large pool of papers to choose from should be considered as an asset for journal publication. 

An interesting observation from the statistics is the unexpectedly longer time taken for the revision of papers by the authors. For example, in October 2005, 30 papers were being revised by the authors to meet the comments and requirements of the reviewers. The average time since the “revise and resubmit” decision for these papers was 470 days (minimum 121 days and maximum 686 days). Normally, the authors are given a limited time to submit a revised version of their papers. After this period, the paper is considered a new submission and may be required to go through the full review process again. The long revision period (and the fact that some papers are not revised at all) may be attributed to different reasons, but my take is that it results from the shortage of petroleum engineering and geosciences professionals in our industry. The increased work responsibilities resulting from increased oil and natural gas activities around the world may not leave time for authors to do the additional work needed on their papers (in particular, if the paper has been presented at a meeting, sometimes journal publication may lose its importance).

Having mentioned the downside of the increased oil and natural gas activity worldwide, I must also comment on the potential positive impact of it. The high oil prices, record company profits, and optimistic predictions for the foreseeable future are also nourishing the interest in research and development for new technology. Naturally, the results of research and development activities are expected to appear in publications eventually. This should make a positive impact on the SPE journals. I am retiring my position as the Executive Editor with full confidence in the continuing quality and greater success of SPEREE.