The Role of the Production Geologist

WHAT DOES A PRODUCTIONGEOLOGIST DO?

The production geologistworks in a subsurface team;a team thatmanages production for a field and looks forways of getting more hydrocarbons out of it. He or shehas a specific role. The production geologist is respon-sible for understanding the geological framework of thereservoir and creating a representation of it, typicallyusing computer software (Figure 2). The object of thismodel is to help understand how the geology both influ-ences fluid flowwithin a producing reservoir and createsdead ends that could potentially trap hydrocarbons. Thebigger dead-end pockets may be worth targeting withnew wells. If these wells look profitable, the geologistwill then take a leading role in planning them with thedrilling engineers.

Production geologists assigned to an operated fieldwill find themselves working as part of amultidisciplin-ary team (Figure 3). In a large company, thiswill includea subsurface manager, geologists, geophysicists, petro-physicists, reservoir engineers, production engineers,chemists, and technical assistants. Some teamsmay alsoinclude drilling engineers and economists (Table 3).

Teamwork is essential because the staggeringly com-plex nature of a subsurface operation means that thevarious disciplines have to integrate their specific areasof expertise for theventure tobe successful (Durrani et al.,1994). Some oil companies have separate geology andengineering departments, although this rarely worksin practice. Short lines of communication should existwithin a subsurface team such that an inclusive atmo-sphere of shared purpose is created. Any problems thatarise can then be quickly recognized and solved bycommondirected action (Satter et al., 1994;Neate, 1996).

1Shepherd, M., 2009, The Role of the production geologist, in M. Shepherd, Oil field

production geology: AAPG Memoir 91, p. 5–6.

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Copyright n2009 by The American Association of Petroleum Geologists.

DOI:10.1306/13161183M913372

FIGURE 2. Production geologists buildthree-dimensional (3-D) computermodels of the larger fields to representthe geology. The figure shows the re-lief on the top surface of a reservoirinterval. Also shown are the paths ofthe wells that intersect the top reser-voir surface.

FIGURE 3. A production geologistworks in a teamwithin an oil company.The subsurface operation is so com-plex that everyone has to integratetheir expertise for the project to workefficiently.

Table 3. Professional disciplines within a subsurface team.

Job Title Job Description

Subsurface manager Manages and coordinates the work of everyone in the subsurfaceteam.

Production geologist Responsible for understanding and modeling the geologicalframework of the reservoir. Helps to identify and plan newwell locations.

Geophysicist Spends much of his/her time interpreting seismic data to define thereservoir structure and fault distribution. Where the seismic dataallow, depositional environment, rock, and fluid properties canalso be characterized.

Petrophysicist A key task is to analyze wireline logs to quantify the rock and fluidproperties of the reservoir at the well scale.

Technical assistant Provides technical support to the team. This includes datamanagement, data preparation, and computer mapping.

Reservoir engineer Predicts how much oil and gas a field is likely to produce, and mayuse a computer simulation of reservoir performance to analyze howthe field will behave as well as taking a lead in reservoir managementactivities.

Production engineer Responsible for optimizing all the mechanical aspects ofhydrocarbon production from the wellbore to the surface facilities.

Production chemist Analyzes and treats problems related to scale formation, metalcorrosion, drilling fluids, wax formation, and solids precipitationbetween the reservoir and the surface facilities.

Drilling engineer (Well engineer) Plans the mechanical aspects of any well operations includingdrilling new wells.

Economist Costs and evaluates any economic activity relevant to the subsurface.

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