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Access to energy is fundamental to the world’s societies. Improving quality of life requires the reliable supply and wise use of energy. Hydrocarbons will remain the main global source of energy for decades to come; however, new scientific understanding and disruptive engineering solutions are required for more effective reservoir access and increased recovery, with reduced environmental impacts.
Subsurface fluids - including hydrocarbons - move along preferential flow paths, or “geo-plumbing.” These flow paths are in turn fed with fluids slowly flowing out of the multiscale (microns to meters in size) regions of lower permeability rock. Fractures, joints and faults can short-circuit fluid flow across scales from microns to kilometers, throwing a monkey wrench into all existing flow theories and numerical models. As reservoir energy and easily accessible rock regions are depleted, only weakly-connected, low-permeability and heterogeneous rock remains.
Continuing hydrocarbon production at the high rates required by global society demands fundamental and applied research that addresses flow - the flow of liquids, gases and dissolved chemical compounds through multiscale, fractured reservoirs with mixed rock wettability. The subtleties of such flow can only be captured by experiment and theories that illuminate the coupled thermo-, hydro-, chemo-, and mechanical (THCM) effects in fluid flow and fluid/rock interactions. Given this context, ANPERC’s raison d’etre - flow - translates into a unique multidisciplinary, collaborative learning and research effort, enabled by the unique set of research skills and infrastructure of KAUST.
DGYM is an interdisciplinary team with diverse expertise, including numerical modeling, machine/deep learning and geo-energy system management.
The study of climatic and sea level change expression in the rock record, and its effect on stratigraphic architecture and the prediction of heterogeneities in the subsurface.
Characterizing the evolution of the Red Sea and the hydrothermal, seismic, and stratigraphic properties of the Arabian Plate.
Modeling and simulation at lab and field scales to address key challenges in Applied Reservoir Engineering.
Develop new workflows for improved hydrocarbon recovery in carbonate rocks & geothermal energy, utilizing advanced instrumentation and techniques.
Experimental and numerical research in ultimate production of oil and gas from hydrofractured horizonal wells in shales; IOR/EOR in carbonate systems; and well sensors, control and near wellbore physics and chemistry.
Professor Shehab Ahmed's research group combines smart grids and petroleum engineering.
Rock and geomechanical behavior of fractured reservoir rocks under drilling, completion, and production conditions–in particular in response to pore pressure changes and impact on reservoir fluid flow and production.