Embedding a petrophysical vocabulary and petrophysical concepts within the petroleum geoscience community; towards a virtual learning capability

Improved communication and understanding of petrophysical concepts has never been more important. This proposal addresses an industry demand for better communication and understanding of petrophysical concepts between petrophysicists and petroleum geoscience and engineering professionals by providing a novel solution. We propose to help the industry define and communicate key concepts through a consistent petrophysical vocabulary; we will achieve this through providing a downloadable, cross-platform, device independent, interactive e-book*. This builds on our considerable petrophysics expertise developed over decades through joint RCUK and industry projects, addresses the NERC call in enabling the development and extension of our industry collaboration though the development of a major international JIP, and impacts unconventional hydrocarbons (e.g. shale oil and gas), extending the life of mature basins, and exploiting challenging environments.

Petrophysics is the study of rocks, specifically the interaction of the solids (minerals) and any fluids (aqueous solutions, oil, gas). As such it is at the centre of the oil and gas industry, and provides quantitative data enabling the volume of oil and gas to be calculated. Given the importance of petrophysics, it is perhaps surprising that there is a lower level of understanding of petrophysical terms and concepts across petroleum geoscience professionals than for other petroleum related subjects, and often this understanding is seriously flawed. Thus the same word or phrase is used by different people or companies to mean different things, multiple words and phrases are used to describe the same concept, and many concepts are poorly or incorrectly understood, with errors being promulgated from one to another without realization. As a result significant and costly misunderstandings can easily arise.

This topic was the focus of a conference in March 2014 in San Diego, attended by operators, service companies, professional trainers, consultants, and academia on "Educating the Petrophysicist". This timely discussion over 3 days raised the question of how we can improve communication between the specialist and the petroleum geoscientist. This is a real challenge because the subject is interdisciplinary and sits at the focus of many subjects, but also because there is no clear training route into petrophysics, and no comprehensive textbook on petrophysics. Today, technology developments in social media and learning provide enhanced platforms that can enable scientists through providing an accessible and well defined set of vocabulary and concepts in petrophysics.

The proposed catalyst funding builds on these developments and our experience over two decades from RCUK and industry funded research, at a critical time when petrophysics is increasingly important to decision-making. This proposal aims to place the UK in a leading position in improving communication and understanding but moreover in providing knowledge exchange between academia and industry, and society. Defining key concepts and establishing a clear and consistent petrophysical vocabulary to enable improved communication with industry and public alike is urgently required.

The main deliverable will be demonstration of an e-book for delivering key petrophysical concepts and vocabulary in a mobile world, and eventually capable of delivering audio and video. This accessible and clearly articulated set of focussed petrophysical concepts and terms, using a consistent vocabulary, will improve communication and understanding between disciplines. This phase will focus on generating outputs that demonstrate the potential to deliver petrophysics in bite-sized chunks, and allows the user to investigate concepts in appropriate depth and detail. This is an initial pilot project demonstrating the feasibility, leading to a substantial collaborative project with industry to deliver a virtual learning environment for industry.