Better reservoir visualisation
Andrew Moore A , David J. Storey A and Darren Stanton ASantos Ltd
The APPEA Journal 52(1) 475-482 https://doi.org/10.1071/AJ11037
Published: 2012
Abstract
Santos, a significant Australian energy company, sponsors open source software to improve 3D reservoir visualisation. The software, TurboVNC, allows users of standard laptops to connect to servers running Paradigm exploration and production software from any network location. Performance, collaboration and data management benefits are coupled with capital and operational savings of $2.5 million AUD. Santos’s TurboVNC project won the global Innovator of the Year award (2011) with Red Hat, suppliers of Linux, the server operating system.
Beyond these immediate benefits, the real value of thin client application delivery is the ability to centralise data in one large database. This facilitates consistent data standards and quality procedures to be applied. New insights and value can be derived from the consolidated big data gathered from the full exploration and production spectrum. The hypothesis is that access to larger, integrated data sets can result in better reservoir models, reduced uncertainty and optimised production.
Andrew Moore holds a BSc (Hons) degree in geography from the London School of Economics. Andrew is a certified MSP Programme Manager and Prince II Practitioner. He has 31 years’ experience in exploration systems design, integration and management with numerous oil and gas companies. This includes senior positions with Occidental, Elf and Petro-Canada in the UK, plus 15 years’ experience as an independent consultant, including two years with BP in Stavanger and long-term contracts with Norsk Hydro, Enterprise, Chevron and Amerada Hess in London. He developed and presented Unix-system training courses with Cambrian Consultants, including Unix for geoscientists to more than 1,000 geoscientists worldwide. He has been an instructor at Sun Microsystems for the Unix, TCP/IP and E10000 server curricula and at Learning Tree International for Unix/Linux user and administrator courses, including five years as a technical editor. Andrew is the information systems manager for subsurface with Santos Ltd and has accountability for all geoscience applications, data management and spatial information systems. Member: PESGB and PESA. andrew.moore@santos.com |
David J. Storey BEE, MBA, has 37 years’ experience as an oil and gas professional, from field operations to international business development and technology introduction. David’s area of expertise is new business, working with others to apply ideas and technology to new business opportunities. As a senior business analyst for surface information systems at Santos Ltd, he is always striving to go beyond what is known, exploring this potential in the oil and gas business to reveal new horizons of possibility. david.storey@santos.com |
Darren Stanton is an electronics engineer with more than 20 years’ experience as a Unix and Linux systems administrator, mainly in the oil and gas business. Darren is the technical lead and systems architect for the TurboVNC project in Santos and has been responsible for its design and implementation. The pinnacle of his career was receiving the RedHat global Innovator of the Year award for the Santos TurboVNC project at the RedHat Summit in Boston, in May 2011. darren.stanton@santos.com |
