Petro-Canada

Early-stage offshore field development requires screening of technical alternatives, robust scenario evaluation, and seamless interaction between multidisciplinary domains such as reservoir engineering, subsea architecture design, and economic assessment. Despite significant advancements in digital engineering, workflows connecting these disciplines often remain fragmented, relying heavily on manual data transfer, spreadsheet consolidation, and expert-driven interpretation. This fragmentation introduces delays, increases the risk of inconsistency, and limits the number of development pathways that can realistically be explored within Front-End-Loading stages. The increasing complexity of offshore reservoirs, combined with tighter economic margins and the need for transparent, auditable decision-making, highlights the necessity for integrated, automated workflows. By bridging simulation environments and conceptual engineering tools through programmable interfaces, it becomes possible to unify data flows, enforce engineering logic, and reduce turnaround time without compromising technical consistency. This paper presents a fully integrated framework that bridges the gap between numerical reservoir simulation and automated subsea concept generation. By leveraging a sensitivity cube approach derived from physics-based simulations, the proposed workflow facilitates the rapid synthesis of realistic field development architectures. This integration allows for the direct coupling of dynamic production profiles with rigorous economic assessment, enabling the calculation of Capital Expenditure (CAPEX), Operational Expenditure (OPEX), and Net Present Value (NPV) across a vast design space. Unlike traditional fragmented workflows, this system supports holistic iterative optimization between subsurface and facilities domains. The result is a substantial enhancement in engineering consistency, process autonomy, and evaluation speed, critical attributes for robust decision-making during early project framing and Front-End Loading (FEL) phases.

Significant breakthroughs have been made recently in petroleum exploration within ultra-deep (burial depth > 6,000 m) carbonates in the Tarim Basin, northwestern China. The discovery of several large-scale oil and gas accumulation (e.g., Shunbei and Fuman) in these deeply buried, highly fractured and vuggy carbonates highlights the crucial role of strike-slip faults in reservoir development. However, the formation mechanisms of these ultra-deep, fault-controlled carbonate reservoirs remain poorly understood. It is therefore essential to conduct experimental simulations investigating the controlling factors and evolutionary trends governing the impact of deep CO₂-rich fluids on carbonate rocks.For this reason, experiments were performed by using an ultra-deep, multi-tectonic-stage, high-temperature and high-pressure reservoir simulation system. This study focused on two key aspects, the dissolution mechanisms of dolomite in CO₂-saturated solutions, and the evolutionary trends of pore structure in carbonate rocks with different initial pore types during dissolution. Overall, two major findings were obtained. First, within temperature of 40–220 °C and pressure of 10–132 MPa, the saturated dissolution capacity of dolomite in CO₂-rich fluids exhibited an initial increase that was followed by a decrease, with the maximum dissolution occurred approximately at 60–110°C. This provides the theoretical basis for predicting favorable depth intervals where large-scale secondary pores may be formed in dolomite by deep CO₂-rich fluids. Second, influenced by the deep CO2-rich fluid dissolution, both pore-dominated and fracture-dominated limestones tend to transform into fracture-vug reservoirs. Dissolution preferentially occurred along major fractures, gradually enhancing reservoir space and percolation capacity, ultimately becoming concentrated within these main fracture systems.These results led to the construction of a genetic model for the development of fault-controlled, fracture-vug carbonate reservoirs. When deep CO2-rich fluid activity coincides with fault development periods, fluids preferentially migrate into main faults, leading to dissolution-enlarged porosity along fault planes. When fluids migrate to fault intersections, they stagnate and induce dissolution and connectivity to form vugs. The fluids continue to expand along multiple sets of pre-existing faults, stagnating at new fault intersections to create more vugs. Such dissolution cycles are controlled by the episodic regional tectono-fluid activity. Ultimately, early-formed fracture-vug systems may become merged to formwell-connected fracture-vug reservoirs with superior reservoir performance. This model effectively explains the differences in dissolution and modification effects observed in different segments of strike-slip faults and clarifies the underlying mechanisms.

ABSTRACT Early carbonate cement is common and widely distributed in clastic rocks and has a complex impact on the quality of clastic reservoirs. At present, although there are studies indicating that early formation of carbonate cement can protect reservoirs to a certain extent, there is no empirical evidence to prove it. Early carbonate is the most abundant cement in the Cretaceous continental ultradeep clastic sandstone in the Kuqa depression. The petrographic characteristics, spatial distribution, and geochemical characteristics of early carbonate cements in the Cretaceous sandstone reservoir are systematically investigated to discuss the origin, distinct distribution, and multifaceted impact on ultradeep clastic reservoirs. During the early Paleogene, meteoric water leached the Paleogene carbonate rocks, providing material for early carbonate cements. Affected by lateral recharge of meteoric water, the vertical recharge of seawater, and the normal-graded sequence, early calcite and dolomite cements with significantly spatial different distribution characteristics were precipitated in the ultradeep clastic reservoirs. Due to the differences in the content and compaction resistance of early calcite and dolomite, their impact on reservoir quality is opposite. Early calcite occupies the reservoir space to varying degrees and has weak compaction resistance, seriously damaging the reservoir quality. Early dolomite has a relatively low content and strong compaction resistance, which can effectively protect the reservoir during deep burial and strong lateral compression processes. This study provides a good example of the positive effect of early carbonate cements on the formation and development of high-quality reservoirs.

Abstract The southern margin of the Junggar Basin is abundant in oil and gas resources, with substantial exploration potential. However, the region's complex surface conditions, marked by significant elevation variations, abrupt near‐surface structural changes and uneven gravel layer thickness in the foreland, present significant challenges for static correction. These complexities severely impact imaging accuracy and impede further exploration efforts. To address these challenges, we propose a multi‐information‐constrained static‐correction method that integrates first‐arrival traveltime tomography with refraction traveltime migration. The tomography is constrained by jointly utilizing seismic first‐arrival times, micro‐well logs and geological outcrop data, yielding a geologically plausible near‐surface velocity model. This model then serves as the input for refraction traveltime migration, which is employed to delineate the geometry of the low‐velocity weathering layer with higher fidelity, ultimately leading to more accurate static corrections. The application in the Junggar Basin foreland shows that our method produces a sharper, more geologically consistent weathering‐layer interface compared to conventional tomography using a velocity contour datum. This leads to superior static corrections, evidenced by enhanced reflection continuity and sharper focus in the final stacked image.

To optimize production efficiency and on-time delivery in prefabricated construction, the study addresses parallel machine scheduling in production workshops while incorporating constraints including worker shift schedules, zero-buffer limitations, and process dependencies. A multi-objective optimization model is established with dual goals of minimizing makes pan and reducing machine load imbalance rate. An Improved Artificial Bee Colony algorithm is designed to solve the model, effectively arranging production sequences and machine allocations. Numerical experiments using real production data from a concrete precast plant demonstrate the algorithm's superior performance

The article investigates key success factors and reasons for failures of the oil sectors in countries of North and South America: Argentina, Brazil, Venezuela, Guyana, Canada, Colombia, and Mexico. It gives a brief overview of resource potential and dynamics of hydrocarbon production in these countries. The authors analyze such parameters of the oil sector development as technological progress, sector structure, efficient institutions, government energy policy, including fiscal system, energy reforms, i.e. promotion of competition, partial privatization of national oil companies, attraction of international oil corporations, ensuring a stable regulatory climate, and reasonable localization policy. Conclusion is made that a sustainable development of the oil sector and oil production growth that meets the strategic goals of the government depends not only on resource potential, but also on energy policy, sensible and timely reforms, viable institutions and favorable investment climate.

• AQ mapping revealed microtexture evolution in three coals of varying rank. • Synchrotron ATR-FTIR mapped aromaticity, DOC and CH 2 /CH 3 aligned with AQ images. • Early CH 3 loss in high-rank coals promoted lenticular and ribbon texture growth. • This occurred via synchronized increases in DOC and aromaticity during coking. • Aliphatic retention (–CH 3 ) in low-rank coal limited anisotropic texture formation. This study investigates the mechanisms of microtexture development during coking and the influence of chemical structure transitions during plastic layer formation, using anisotropy quotient (AQ) colour-coded bireflectance mapping and synchrotron macro attenuated total reflectance Fourier transform infrared (macro ATR-FTIR) microspectroscopy. Plastic layer samples, including the plastic layer, resolidified layer, and semi coke regions, were produced from three Australian coking coals of varying rank via interrupted coking tests in a lab scale double wall heated coke oven designed to simulate practical coking conditions. AQ mapping revealed changes in microtexture components such as isotropic inert, incipient vitrinite, and lenticular and ribbon structures across the plastic layer samples. These microtextural transitions were correlated with spatial distributions of aromaticity, degree of aromatic ring condensation (DOC), and CH 2 /CH 3 , derived from macro ATR-FTIR mapping. During the transformation from the plastic layer to early semi coke, anisotropic content, particularly longer carbon structures such as ribbon and lenticular forms, increased more significantly in higher rank coals. For higher rank coals, incipient and circular structures formed during early resolidification exhibited low DOC and aromaticity but high CH 2 /CH 3 , suggesting extensive CH 2 crosslinking that may have facilitated subsequent carbon structure growth. With further coking toward the early semi coke stage, these structures evolved into more anisotropic microtextures, particularly ribbons and lenticular forms, accompanied by synchronised increases in aromaticity and DOC. In contrast, the lowest rank coal exhibited low CH 2 /CH 3 and DOC within circular and lenticular structures at the early resolidification stage, indicative of a higher content of residual methyl groups. These aliphatic residues likely acted as barriers to aromatic stacking and condensation, thereby constraining the development of ribbon and lenticular structures.