Prospect Evaluation and Risk & Volume Assessment

About this training course
A decision to drill an exploration well with the objective to find a new oil or gas field must be based on a sound assessment of the prospect's risks and of the volumes: - what is the chance that a well will find hydrocarbons, and - how much could it be? Risk and volume assessments form the basis for decisions to drill a well or not, and as such form the link between subsurface evaluation and the business aspects of the petroleum industry. This 5 day course explains how risks and volumes can be assessed in a realistic manner based on a sound understanding of the geological details of the prospect as well as of its regional geological setting and current play understanding.
What this course will cover in 5 days The course will demonstrate that realistic risk and volume assessment is not a "black box" operation but needs geological understanding of the prospect, and the regional setting.

Specific topics that will be discussed include the following:
 The statistical fundamentals for risk and volume assessment will be presented, with practical exercises for understanding the results of a risk & volume assessment displayed in expectation curves.
 The difference between risk and uncertainty.
 A discussion of the essential requirements for a working petroleum system: trap, reservoir, seal and charge.
 Exercises in and guidelines for estimating uncertainties for prospect parameters, including practical advice for meaningful distributions for uncertainty ranges. Particular emphasis will be given to estimating hydrocarbon column lengths with their associated uncertainties in undrilled prospects.
 Prospects and plays; the value of play maps and how these should be used for assessment of prospect risks and for ranking of prospects within a play.
 Calculating volume ranges for prospects.
 Calculating volumes for groups of prospects; how to add risked prospect volumes for a statistically correct representation of the volume promise of a portfolio of prospects.
 Geophysical evidence: incorporating geophysical evidence (DHIs) consistently and realistically in a risk assessment. An understandable and geology-based workflow, consistent with Bayes theorem, will be presented