Optimizing Gas Fields using Integrated Asset Modeling (IAM), and Introduction to Optimizing Shale Gas and Tight Oil Fields

S. M. (Sam) Avasthi, PE, PhD, is Chairman and CEO, and Director of Engineering,  EOR/IOR, and CCUS, at Avasthi & Associates, Inc., a worldwide energy consulting company headquartered in Houston, Texas ( www.AvasthiConsulting.com ). In addition to providing strategic direction and leadership to the company, that he founded in 1990 and that now provides full-service, multi-specialty, integrated consulting services to the worldwide oil & gas industry for onshore and offshore (shallow and deep water), conventional and unconventional/shale, oil, gas, gas-condensate/volatile oil, and heavy (and extra heavy) oil field evaluation, development, and optimization (to maximize oil & gas recovery and project profitability), as well as for improved oil recovery (IOR) / enhanced oil recovery (EOR), CO2 EOR, CCUS / CO2 geosequestration, carbon management, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and related projects, he is active in consulting and training in his areas of technical expertise. 

Dr. Sam Avasthi has over 50 years of worldwide oil & gas industry experience in petroleum engineering, reservoir engineering and simulation/modeling, CO2 EOR project design, evaluation and optimization; revitalizing mature oil fields, and related projects. He has been providing consulting services to the worldwide oil & gas industry since the early 1970s; and has been involved in conducting reservoir engineering and simulation studies of some of the major EOR/IOR projects.

Dr. Sam Avasthi has lectured extensively, around the world, on numerous topics in his areas of technical expertise. He is a co-instructor of several popular public training courses taught under the auspicious of the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE): ‘Practical Aspects of CO2 Flooding EOR’, ‘Geological Sequestration of CO2’, ‘Practical Aspects of Thermal EOR’, ‘Practical Aspects of Shale EOR’, ‘Optimizing Gas Fields using Integrated Asset Modeling (IAM), and Introduction to Optimizing Shale Gas and Tight Oil Fields’, ‘Practical Reservoir Surveillance and Management Techniques for EOR/IOR Projects’, ‘Practical Techniques for Screening Deepwater Offshore Oil and Gas Exploration Prospects’.

Dr. Sam Avasthi is an engineering alumnus of the Indian Institute of Technology (Indian School of Mines), Imperial College London, and Texas A&M University (where he earned a Ph.D. degree in Petroleum Engineering). He was a Research Fellow in Chemical Engineering at Rice University; and worked for several years in senior-level petroleum engineering and consulting positions with major integrated global energy and consulting companies before founding Avasthi & Associates, Inc. in 1990. He is a licensed Professional Engineer (P.E.) in Texas, a Legion of Honor member of SPE, and a Technical Editor for four SPE publications (SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering Journal, SPE Production & Operations Journal, SPE Journal, and Oil & Gas Facilities). He can be contacted by email ( Sam.Avasthi@AvasthiConsulting.com ), or at LinkedIn [ Dr. S. M. (Sam) Avasthi, P.E. 

Luiz C. Amado, PhD, an expert in reservoir engineering, PVT/ compositional simulation, and Integrated Asset Modeling (IAM), works with ENI Petroleum as a Senior Reservoir Engineer.

Amado has over 20 years of oil and gas industry experience, working with Shell, Petrobras, Ecopetrol, Nexen Petroleum and Schlumberger. He started his career as a Senior Reservoir Engineer with Schlumberger, where he was involved in conducting reservoir engineering and simulation studies of onshore gas and gas-condensate fields in Mexico. During his 10-year career with Shell, as a Senior Reservoir Engineer, he worked on several projects in UK, Brazil and USA. In UK, he was involved in reservoir engineering and simulation studies, and operations, in the Southern North Sea gas and gas-condensate fields. He was responsible for development of the Leman field integrated system model to carry out reservoir engineering tasks in support of operations, field monitoring and optimization. As part of the Leman field IAM study, he was involved in the compressor upgrade project and debottlenecking study for the integrated surface network. He was also responsible for reservoir engineering studies of Bijupira and Salema fields in Brazil. As a Senior Reservoir Engineer for Shell in Houston, he worked on deepwater reservoir engineering projects in GOM (Llano field), and at exploration areas in Brazil (Santos, Campos and Espirito Santo basins), as well as on projects in other areas in South America and South Caribbean. As a Senior Reservoir Engineer for Petrobras America, Dr. Amado worked on reservoir engineering projects to evaluate prospect opportunities in Pliocene, Miocene and Lower Tertiary plays of GOM, and reservoir engineering studies for Hadrian project and Cottonwood gas-condensate field, both in the deepwater GOM. He also worked as a Lead Reservoir Engineer for Ecopetrol America, providing reservoir-engineering support to evaluate opportunities in Pliocene, Miocene and Lower Tertiary plays of GOM and K2 field in GOM. He also worked as an Appraisal Reservoir Engineer for Nexen Petroleum, providing reservoir-engineering support to evaluate opportunities in GOM.

Amado holds a BS in civil engineering from Federal Fluminense University, Brazil; an MS in petroleum engineering from Campinas State University, Brazil; and a PhD in petroleum engineering from the University of Leoben, Austria. He is a long-standing member of SPE, and has served on several SPE technical committees and conference boards. He is a co-instructor of two popular SPE training courses: ‘Optimizing Gas Fields using Integrated Asset Modeling (IAM), and Introduction to Optimizing Shale Gas and Tight Oil Fields’, and ‘Practical Techniques for Screening Deepwater Offshore Oil and Gas Exploration Prospects’. He is fluent in English, Spanish, and Portuguese.

S. M. (Sam) Avasthi, PE, PhD, is chairman and CEO, and director of engineering and EOR/IOR, at Avasthi & Associates, Inc., a worldwide energy consulting company, headquartered in Houston, Texas. In addition to providing strategic direction and leadership to the company that he founded in 1990, and that now provides full-service integrated consulting services to the worldwide oil and gas industry for onshore and offshore, conventional and unconventional/shale, oil, gas, gas-condensate/volatile oil, and heavy (and extra heavy) oil field evaluation, development and optimization (to maximize oil and gas recovery and project profitability), he is active in consulting and training in his areas of technical expertise.

Avasthi is an engineering alumnus of the Indian School of Mines, Imperial College London, and Texas A&M University (where he earned a PhD in petroleum engineering). He was a research fellow in chemical engineering at Rice University, and worked for several years in senior-level petroleum engineering and consulting positions with major global integrated oil and gas producing and consulting companies before founding Avasthi & Associates, Inc. in 1990.

Avasthi is a registered professional engineer (PE) in Texas, a Legion of Honor member of the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE), and a technical editor of the SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering Journal, SPE Production & Operations Journal, and the Journal of Canadian Petroleum Technology. He is a co-instructor of several popular courses taught under the auspices of SPE, including, Practical Aspects of CO₂ Flooding EOR, Geological Sequestration of CO₂, Practical Aspects of Thermal EOR, Practical Reservoir Surveillance and Management Techniques for EOR/IOR Projects, Optimizing Gas Fields using Integrated Asset Modeling (IAM), and Optimizing Shale Plays, and Practical Techniques for Screening Deepwater Offshore Oil & Gas Exploration Prospects.

J. M. (Jay) Avasthi, PhD, is President and COO, and Director of Geoservices (Geomechanics, Geosciences, and CO2 Geosequestration) and Unconventional / Shale Resources Evaluation, Development and Optimization, at Avasthi & Associates, Inc., a worldwide energy consulting company headquartered in Houston, Texas (www.AvasthiConsulting.com). In addition to managing the worldwide consulting and training services operations of the company, which he joined in 2003, he is active in consulting and training in his areas of technical expertise.
 
Dr. Jay Avasthi has over 40 years of worldwide oil & gas industry experience, including 24 years with Chevron Corporation in geomechanics, well stimulation, rock properties, wellbore stability, and sand production prediction research and supervision. His expertise includes acquisition, calibration and use of the in-situ stress data for oil & gas well construction and production, and for waterflood (IOR) and CO2 flood (EOR) project performance improvement; and solving fracturing stimulation, waste disposal through injection, wellbore stability, wellbore mechanics, and sand production prediction problems. 

Dr. Jay Avasthi has been actively involved in technological advancements in the areas of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing since 1990. He is the inventor/author of a United States patent (Number 4,977,961) on ‘Method to Create Parallel Vertical Fractures in Inclined Wellbores’. In addition, he has authored/ co-authored numerous technical publications in peer-reviewed SPE, and other technical, journals; has taught several short courses, and conducted several hands-on training workshops, in his areas of technical expertise, around the world. He is a co-instructor of four popular training courses taught under the auspicious of SPE: ‘Practical Aspects of CO2 Flooding EOR’, ‘Geological Sequestration of CO2’, ‘Optimizing Gas Fields using Integrated Asset Modeling (IAM), and Introduction to Optimizing Shale Gas and Tight Oil Fields’, and ‘Practical Aspects of Shale EOR’.

Dr. Jay Avasthi is an engineering and geosciences alumnus of the Indian Institute of Technology (Indian School of Mines), the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison (where he earned a Ph.D. degree in Mining Engineering, with specialization in Rock Mechanics). He worked in senior-level engineering, research and supervisory positions at Chevron Corporation for 24 years, before joining Avasthi & Associates, Inc. in 2003. He is a long-standing member of SPE, a Technical Editor for the SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering Journal; and has served as the SPE Los Angeles Basin Section Director and Program Chairman. 
 

Bijay S. Banthia, P.E., an expert reservoir engineer with extensive worldwide oil and gas industry experience in EOR/IOR reservoir engineering and simulation, CO₂ EOR, oil & gas and shale resources development and optimization projects, has worked with Avasthi & Associates, Inc. (A&A) as a Principal EOR/IOR Reservoir Engineering and Simulation, CO₂ EOR, and Shale Resources Development and Optimization Consultant since 2014, and provides consulting and training services in his areas of technical expertise.

Banthia has 40-plus years of worldwide oil & gas industry experience, having worked with several oil & gas producing companies (Mobil Oil, Aramco, Fina, EOG, Oil India, and ONGC), and consulting companies. His extensive industry experience includes working on major CO₂ EOR, waterflood optimization, reservoir engineering and simulation, and, onshore and offshore, oil & gas field development planning and management projects, around the world. He was a consultant to Shell on Eagle Ford Shale resources development, and to Devon on Utica, Niobrara and Tuscaloosa-Marine Shale (TMS) resources development, as well as on waterflood optimization and on CO₂ EOR projects.

Banthia is a petroleum-engineering alumnus of the Indian School of Mines, and the University of California, Berkeley, where he earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees, respectively. He also holds a master’s degree in engineering management from Missouri University of Science & Technology, Rolla. He is a Registered Professional Engineer (P.E.) in Texas, and a long-standing member of SPE and SPWLA. He has made numerous presentations at technical meetings, and published several papers in technical journals, in his areas of technical expertise.