Energy and Flow Assurance

The SIG Charter

The SIG will integrate with industry, develop best practice, improve confidence, and influence investment decisions in the use of modelling & simulation. These activities are intended to derive economic value and growth, promote positive message of the oil and gas industry to governments and the public, considering the pressures of energy security and climate change.

Objective:
Understand and capture the goals, inhibitors and challenges that face the sector via niche dissemination programmes based on seminars, courses, and ERCOFTAC Bulletin articles, and the development of accurate, reliable Databanks. These programmes should be supported on regular annual basis.

A Constellation of Key Drivers:

1. Understand increasing recovery rates and cost reduction:

• Primary recovery rates are becoming both difficult and expensive.
• Technological trends and best practices can support enhanced/improved recovery at cost.
• Provide a platform to facilitate understanding of complex oil and gas reservoir environment, from on-shore to off-shore, including shale gas fracking.
• Explore and endorse novel machine designs and technologies, with a view to reductions in item CAPEX and/or OPEX.

2. Develop state-of-the-art CFD test cases:

• Assess on continuous basis what is niche and valuable as asset test cases.
• The CFD test case should always deliver clear positive modelling advantage to the community.

3. Develop the route to Real Time Modelling & Simulations (RTMS), and sub RTMS:

• Running simulations in real time with validation from operations data
• Further improve and support rapid assessment and intervention techniques
• Hence, through RTMS , pre-qualify operational transients and / minimise the length of shut-down periods

4. Maintain subsea advantage in expertise:

• Subsea production is a major departure from conventional production operations
• This implies operating in remote and unexplored areas on earth
• Therefore monitoring and intervention far more difficult and establishes fundamental environmental issues

5. Safety and Integrity Management of Operations in Harsh Environments:

• Support CFD/-FEA as a key critical analysis tool
• Support further CFD/-FEA development for rapid solutions via scenario analysis tools
• Support advances in turbulence modelling
• Support advances in multiphase modelling/general mixing/bubble columns, and combustion/fluidised bed systems
• Support Studies in risk assessment in a scarce information environment
• Hence, express an Uncertainty Management and Quantification framework
• Collaborate on HPC, leading to order of magnitude in critical analysis solutions
• Thus, minimise/avoid inadequate/mitigate high-risk in engineering designs

6. Develop Best Practice Guidelines:

• The above drivers should act as a platform to develop well posed guidance on simulation and modelling for the application in the Oil and Gas industry
• Best Practice Guidelines that assure added value to the simulation & modelling environment
• Support the Oil & Gas Asset Integrity Management System, where CFD/CFD-FEA is an invaluable tool