EDITORIAL

Special Topic IssueÐOil and Gas

An Ever Changing Scenario

This special topic issue relates to the upstream oil andgas sector, a speci®c focus which commenced in the early1980s born out of the Institution’s subject group on Oil andNatural Gas (SONG). Many might be surprised that from amembership perspective SONG is one of the most success-ful subject groups and for many years has maintainedregular monthly meetings where technical presentationstake place in an informal atmosphere. The establishment ofSONG and the biannual special issue on this topic wasduring the considerable growth in oil exploration anddevelopment activity in the North Sea where such activitiesgenerated a range of technical challenges. During the lastdecade, other perspectives of safety and the environmentprovided further technical and related commercial hurdlesto be overcome.

The Oil and Gas editorials appearing in these specialissues have re¯ected the continuing changing perspectivesso characteristic of this industrial sector. The cyclical natureof the industry is well known, as global supply and demand®gures for this vital world resource are determined atpolitical levels. The short period of this cyclical nature isemphasized in relation to the oil price, which since the lastissue in July 1998, dropped to $10 a barrel and is now ataround $27 a barrel. The $10 price, although only lasting afew months, has been one of the biggest challenges to theindustry in its recent history, and well below previousscenarios. The impact has been considerable as operatingand service companies have sought to reduce costs to enablepro®table operations to continue in such a low price environ-ment. In sectors like the North Sea, now a more mature oilprovince compared to the early 1980s, where uplift costs aregreater than in some other areas, there has been a con-siderable decline in exploration activity and a hold on anumber of projects.

One of the casualties in the UK has also been the publicperception of the industry as seen by potential career-seeking graduates. The combined impact of staff reductionand concerns over environmental issues has reduced thedemand for working in this sector. The reality is in factthat the challenge to recover oil and gas in a safe andenvironmentally acceptable manner from deeper waterdepths and remote locations requires the highest technicaland management skills, and provides a very satisfyingcareer. Another and new outcome of this short-term oilprice scenario has been the consolidation within theindustry, providing an additional mechanism to reducecosts. The merging of major operating companies like BP,Amoco and Arco, Mobil with Exxon and Total, Fina andElf would not have been a perspective thirty years agowhen companies competed in the various world oilprovinces.

As we have now survived the turn-of-the-century ITchallenge into the 21st century, all of the above perspectivesintroduced to combat the low oil price are also having animpact on research. R&D is being driven by the perspectiveof how will it make a major impact on the business withrespect to the current and imminent technical and commercialchallenges facing the industry. A possible casualty is wherethe responsibility lies for more long-term and blue-skyresearch. It certainly is not the priority of the asset teamstasked with delivering the maximum recovery from aparticular oil®eld. Whereas in other sectors the maintenanceof long-term and blue-sky research is publicly funded at thenational and European level, such funding for the oil sectormay not be considered by some as such a priority ascompared, for example, to the medical sector. The oil sectoris perceived as being able to ®nance its own related basicresearch which is not considered for more pro®tableindustrial sectors. It is encouraging, however, that theEPSRC is covering the following objectives in collaborationwith the DTI in promoting research in this area. At the timeof this publication, the EPSRC under its oil and gasprogramme will be receiving responses for research projectsunder the following headings:

· reduction of the environmental impact of oil and gasactivities;· improvement of the effectiveness of oil and gas discoveryand assessment technologies;· improvement of the economics and effectiveness of oiland gas drilling technology;· improvement of the effectiveness of oil and gas reservoirmanagement;· improvement of the safety, economics and effectivenessof oil and gas infrastructure design and operation.

Many of these projects will be seeking company spon-sorship alongside the public sector contribution. Unfor-tunately, however, an impact of the merging of companies,like the above eight to three companies, has not only beenthe amalgamation of research activities and the loss of jobopportunities for those previously involved, but also thereduction in the number of potential research collaborators.

Other technical issues driven by environmental andpolitical perspectives are related to the importance of gasas a valued resource not to be wastefully emitted to theenvironment. To the chemical engineer, gas provides anexciting worldwide challenge to economically transport thisenergy commodity and/or convert it to other useful pro-ducts. Enhanced oil recovery was not on the agenda inthe late 1980s and 1990s when the price of oil put suchsophisticated processes outside project viability. Thechange to a more integrated and sustainable approach, a

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characteristic of modern technical management, is such thatenhanced oil recovery processes will be more frequent thanin the last twenty years. For example, the application of arange of gas injection enhanced oil recovery processes arealready having a positive commercial and environmentalimpact as both a viable use of surplus gas combine withgreater recovery of in place oil. It is interesting to note thatthe implementation of these huge schemes are stimulatingbasic research as a result of the lack of understanding insuch fundaments as ¯ow in porous media.

The last oil and gas special topic issue (July 1998) featureda paper looking into the future with possible roadmaps ofactivity. It would be interesting to re-examine these `crystalball’ perspectives to see how the continuing changes in thisindustry are enabling progress in the subjects identi®ed.

The ®rst seven papers in this year’s Oil and Gas issuecover a number of upstream oil and gas related topics.Advanced computing techniques are having a considerableimpact on many sectors. The paper by Murray et al.,considers the application of arti®cial intelligence techniquesin process control and optimization in the oil and gasindustry. Gas-liquid separators, which are essential com-ponents in oil production operations, are the focus of thenext two papers. Priestman and Tippetts’ paper considersthe application of a new concept in level control using a no-moving-part ¯uidic valve. The issue of separator operation

on a ¯oating processing facility, a more common scenario asreservoirs are developed in deeper waters, is covered in thepaper by Waldie and White.

Drilling accounts for a signi®cant proportion of the costsof exploration and development. Many operations indrilling, producing and injection in reservoir wells can berelated to a number of chemical engineering unit operations.Not least is ®ltration and in the paper by Fisher et al., apredictive procedure is presented for drilling mud cakegrowth and ¯uid invasion during the drilling operation.Thermal recovery methods using in situ combustion havebeen generally restricted to the recovery of heavy oil. Thetwo papers by Greaves et al. present the results of experi-ments where the application is air injection into mediumheavy oils and a light oil. Gas hydrates of little interest inearlier years are on the agenda of an increasing widetechnical community from concerns in the oil and gasindustry of hydrocarbon production and pipeline transport,to safety concerns in deep water drilling operations and theexistence of hydrates in subsea sediments. The ongoingdevelopment in the data associated with the thermodynamicequilibrium of gas hydrates is presented in a paper byéstergaard and his colleagues.

Adrian ToddSubject EditorÐOil and Natural Gas Production

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