Improved Recovery Week articles from April 1996

Improved Recovery Week archives from April 1996

IOR expectations cited in added U.K., Norway reserves. (improved oil recovery)
April 1, 1996... Expectations are thought to add at least 20% more to any outcome. But in the North Sea and Atlantic Frontier areas off the United Kingdom and Norway, there's even more of a premium. About two-thirds of additional U.K. North Sea oil...

Canadian heavy oil stressed in deals.
April 1, 1996... Emphasis on making Western Canadian heavy oil development the object of major thrusts was indicated last week in two corporate actions. In one case, a planned takeover of Strike Energy Ltd. by Tarragon Oil & Gas Ltd., both of Calgary,...

Canadian panel surveys heavy oil research.
April 1, 1996... In a recent report to its producing company members by the Canadian Oil Sands Network for Research and Development (CONRAD), the In Situ Technical Planning Group reported it has surveyed research projects in an attempt to help reduce the...

Groups seek more petroleum tech. funding. (European Union funding of oil and gas technology)
April 1, 1996... Scientists have launched a campaign to seek more European Union funding of oil and gas technology. At present, only about 6% of sums allocated for energy research goes to the petroleum sector -- despite the two fuels contributing more...

Seismic crew demand said growing fast.
April 1, 1996... Being in demand is always an exhausting business. And it appears seismic crews both in this country and abroad are about to become thoroughly exhausted. However, like the contract drilling industry, geophysical contractors are still a...

IOR reports available from NTIS. (improved oil recovery; National Technical Information Service)
April 1, 1996... The following reports on improved oil and gas recovery processes and tools are available from the National Technical Information Service, 5285 Port Royal Rd., Springfield, Va. 22161. Call 703-487-4650 (fax 703-321-8547) for details and prices....

CO2 demo projects making gains, says updated DOE report.
April 8, 1996... The Energy Dept.'s Bartlesville, Okla. Project Office (BPO) recently updated the six immiscible and miscible carbon dioxide projects being conducted under DOE's Reservoir Class Demonstration Program. In it, BPO research associates discuss...

UT resource center grows. (University of Texas at Austin)
April 8, 1996... The Univ. of Texas at Austin's Bureau of Economic Geology continues to expand its Resource Center since it opened last summer. According to BEG officials, the Resource Center is part of the Petroleum Technology Transfer Council's Texas...

Virtual reality used in field planning. (gas fields)
April 8, 1996... Technology used in the making of the motion picture Jurassic Park is helping North Sea engineers cue the cost of offshore installations to tap hydrocarbons from real Jurassic and other layers of reservoir rock. Conoco (U.K.) Ltd. is among...

Key-WellTech merger finaled. (Key Energy Group Inc.; WellTech Inc.)
April 8, 1996... Key Energy Group, Inc., New Brunswick, N.J., has completed its merger with WellTech, Inc. of Houston. Under terms, WellTech common shareholders will receive about 3.5 million shares of newly issued Key common shares and new Key warrants...

U.K. oil websites debuted.
April 8, 1996... Oil and gas industry researchers around the world are being offered free access to an information service compiled by the U.K.'s Petroleum Science and Technology Institute. The only condition is that other groups using the system, known...

Amoco places first in '95 Texas oil production. (Amoco Production Co.)
April 8, 1996... The top oil producer in Texas last year was Amoco Production Co., out-producing second-place Exxon Corp. by a wide margin, according to figures released recently by the Texas Railroad Commission. Amoco averaged 117,142 b/d, or 8.5% of all...

Phillips Petroleum nominated. (1996 Computerworld Smithsonian Award)
April 8, 1996... Phillips Petroleum Co. is the sole nominee from the petroleum industry for the 1996 Computerworld Smithsonian Award (CWSA) for breakthroughs in information technology. The Bartlesville, Okla.-based producing company was nominated for its...

Well log software offered. (Kansas Geological Survey)
April 8, 1996... A new software package for real-time, interactive analysis of well logs is now available from the Kansas Geological Survey, based at the University of Kansas at Lawrence. The program, called PfEFFER (Petrofacies Evaluation of Formation...

Zydeco: good times to roll in T-zone 3-D. (Zydeco Energy Inc.)
April 8, 1996... This coming summer, Zydeco Energy Inc., a Houston independent, will use its exclusive license to 3-D "wave field imaging" technology to explore a strip of the Louisiana coast in western Cameron Parish. There, they say, 3-D seismic has...

Former single-well field could be one of California's largest. (North Shafter oil field)
April 15, 1996... After spending its first 12 years as a one-well field, fracturing during the past 12 months has elevated the North Shafter field to California's hottest onshore oil play. In fact, though current production from a total of nine wells would not...

Numac horizontals score. (Numac Energy Inc. completes two dual-lateral horizontal oil wells in southeastern Saskatchewan)
April 15, 1996... The winter drilling program mounted by Calgary-based Numac Energy Inc. in southeastern Saskatchewan resulted in a number of single- and dual-lateral horizontal producers, raising the company's light oil reserves by about 1,900 b/d. At...

Oil recovery factor could reach 60-70%
April 15, 1996... Worldwide oil recovery factors could reach 60-70% of oil in place in the next 20 years, according to former International Energy Agency official Herman Franssen. In his present role as petroleum adviser to the government of Oman, Franssen was...

BJ/Nowsco buyout slows. (BJ Services Co.; Nowsco Well Service Ltd.)
April 15, 1996... Houston-based BJ Services Co. recently made an offer to acquire a Canadian competitor, Nowsco Well Service Ltd. for about US$414 million. However, while observers note that a completed merger would make BJ Services the second-largest pressure...

Elan buys Amerada's Alberta heavy oil. (Elan Energy Inc.; Amerada Hess Canada Ltd.)
April 15, 1996... Calgary-based Elan Energy Inc. has purchased the undeveloped heavy oil properties of Amerada Hess Canada Ltd., a unit of U.S. producing company Amerada Hess Corp. And Elan isn't dragging its heels in developing the properties. It plans to...

Texas horiz. permits top 5,000 in February. (horizontal wells)
April 15, 1996... Through February, more than 5,000 horizontal wells had been permitted by the Texas Railroad Commission in the Lone Star State since 1984, when records on such wells first began to be kept. The February total of 40 horizontal permits granted...

Landmark completes buyout. (Landmark Graphics Corp. acquires Western Atlas Software)
April 15, 1996... Landmark Graphics Corp., Houston, has completed its acquisition of the general application software operations of Western Atlas, Inc.'s Software division for some $15 million. Western Atlas software acquired by Landmark includes Production,...

Big Lodgepole shoot slated. (Grant Geophysical Inc and Interactive Seismic Imaging LLC to launch three-dimensional seismic survey)
April 15, 1996... Houston-based Grant Geophysical Inc. and Midland, Texas-based Interactive Seismic Imaging LLC are set to launch a major non-exclusive 3-D seismic survey in the Lodgepole trend of the Williston Basin in North Dakota. Field data acquisition is...

Giddings horizontal flows big. (Adams Resources and Energy Inc. completes dual-lateral horizontal oil well in Giddings field in Grimes County, Texas)
April 15, 1996... Adams Resources & Energy Inc., Houston, has announced completion of the dual-lateral horizontal Que Pasa Well No. 2-H in the Giddings field in Grimes County, Texas. The well, drilled on the 3,900-acre Turkey Creek Prospect, tested at an...

3-D ... your eyelids are drooping ... 3-D.... (three-dimensional seismic technology)
April 15, 1996... Three-dimensional seismic technology has come a long way in a short time, but the industry is still working to give clients more bang for the bucks spent on 3-D surveys. Substantial improvement in the quality of subsurface information from 3-D...

AOSIS reports on IOR, heavy oil. (Alberta Department of Energy, Oil Sands Information Services)
April 15, 1996... The Alberta Dept. of Energy, Oil Sands Information Services makes the following IOR and heavy oil research reports and technical papers available to interested parties. Copies may be ordered by calling AOSIS in Edmonton at 403-427-8382 (fax:...

IOR patent. (patent for method to enhance hydraulic fracturing)
April 15, 1996... A.R. Jennings of Mobil Oil Corp. has patented a method for using thin liquid spacer volumes to enhance hydraulic fracturing. The method comprises injecting a proppant-laden fracturing fluid into a formation or reservoir at a rate and pressure...

Sooner company extends air injection program in Dakotas. (Continental Resources Inc.'s oil well recovery in South Dakota)
April 22, 1996... Enid, Okla.-based Continental Resources Inc. is recovering an average of 30 b/d from oil wells in the Dakotas, more than doubling their primary production, by using high-pressure air injection. The company is injecting high-pressure air into...

DOE picks advisors for Elk Hills sale. (Dept. of Energy; Elk Hills Naval Petroleum Reserve)
April 22, 1996... The Energy Dept. has chosen CS First Boston Corp., New York, N.Y., to advise the government on the sale of its share of the Elk Hills Naval Petroleum Reserve (NPR-1) in California. Petrie, Parkman & Co., Denver, will assist First Boston in...

Utah eyes concessions for Great Salt Lake. (oil and gas leasing)
April 22, 1996... Utah is looking to eliminate some of the obstacles to oil and gas leasing on lands around and under Great Salt Lake. State lands officials completed a proposed leasing plan recently for the lake's ultra-heavy oil, natural gas and dissolved...

RFT data acquisition: battlefield to oilfield. (radio frequency telemetry)
April 22, 1996... A seismic technology pioneered by Phillips Petroleum Co. 20 years ago is still making major contributions to the industry today. It's radio frequency telemetry (RFT) - technology that transmits data from seismic geophones through the air,...

Midway-Sunset, Kern River fields lead California steaming. (enhanced oil recovery)
April 29, 1996... Steam continues to be the enhanced oil recovery tool of choice in California's onshore oil production, as it has for much of the more than three decades since the first steam injection pilot project was undertaken in 1960. According to figures...

Sooner production losses persist. (Oklahoma oil and gas sector)(Industry Overview)
April 29, 1996... It's no wonder there's been a rash of producing property trades involving wells in Oklahoma, what with the continued decline in oil and gas production reported in that state. Preliminary figures from the Oklahoma Corporation Commission, revised...

Chevron's Alba E-R well costly, but prolific. (Chevron UK Ltd.)
April 29, 1996... Planned as an alternative to installing a platform to tap reserves at the southern end of the Alba oil field in the U.K. Sector of the central North Sea, Chevron U.K. Ltd.'s first extended-reach well didn't come cheap. It encountered...

Amoco heavy oil trends up. (Amoco Canada Petroleum Company Ltd.)
April 29, 1996... Amoco Canada Petroleum Co. Ltd. said last week it received approval from the Alberta government to expand its Wolf Lake heavy oil operation near Cold Lake/Primrose in northeastern Alberta. The company says the expansion plan includes...

Aussie coalgas sale pends. (Tri-Star Petroleum Co. sale to Allgas Energy Ltd.)
April 29, 1996... Denver-based Tipperary Corp. says the sale of coalbed methane gas production in Queensland, Australia, owned by it as part of a group, is being sold to a Brisbane utility. Tipperary said it had been notified by the operator of the Comet Ridge...

Phillips, Statoil test WAG in N. Sea. (Phillips Petroleum Co. Norway; water-alternating-gas oil recovery process)
April 29, 1996... Both Phillips Petroleum Co. (Norway) Inc. and Statoil, the Norwegian state oil company, either plan or already are engaged in WAG (water-alternating-gas) processes at two offshore field in the North Sea. According to a recent bulletin from the...

Statoil uses downhole tractor. (Statoil A/S)
April 29, 1996... Savings of about $7.7 million a year are expected by Norway's Statoil through the use of a novel electrically-driven downhole tool called the Well Tractor. The tractor currently is being used to pull tools through horizontal wells in the...

Russ/U.S. meet bids producers. (Advisory Board of the Russian-American Oil and Gas Technology Center)
April 29, 1996... An open meeting of the Advisory Board of the Russian-American Oil and Gas Technology Center will be held May 10 at Houston's Sheraton Astrodome Hotel. Interested producers and individuals are invited to attend at no charge. The center,...

Shell Canada buys Amerada oil sands props. (Shell Canada Ltd.; Amerada Hess Corp.)
April 29, 1996... Last week, Shell Canada Ltd. announced it was the purchaser of Amerada Hess Corp.'s oil sands properties in Western Canada. The announcement came at the company's annual meeting in Calgary, Alberta. Shell Canada said the former Amerada Hess...

Seers still downplaying U.S. oil production.
April 29, 1996... It's prediction time again, and the latest official look-sees don't bode well for domestic crude oil production. And, come to think of it, they aren't overly optimistic about domestic natural gas production, either. The Independent Petroleum...

'Geohazard' detection an added 3-D benefit. (three-dimensional seismic prospecting)
April 29, 1996... By now, the benefits of applying three-dimensional seismic technology to oil and gas exploration/exploitation have been well established. But some operators are finding yet another use for 3-D seismic data - locating potential near-surface...