Research & Enterprise Services (RES)

Heriot-Watt Inaugural Lecture Series 2011-12

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Mathematical rocks: from the world’s largest oil reservoirs to explosive volcanoes
23rd February 2012- Professor Sebastian Geiger Foundation CMG Industry Research Chair in Carbonate Reservoir Simulation, Institutue of Petroleum Engineering   Cairn Lecture Theatre ,Postgraduate Centre 4.30pm - Refreshments 5.00pm - Lecture

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Abstract:

The Earth’s subsurface plays a fundamental role in our society. Every day, it provides us with energy in form of oil, gas, and heat. We use it to extract natural resources such as water and base metals or to dispose waste and greenhouse gases; and it is the source of geohazards such as earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. A key commonality between all these processes is that they are governed by fluids (e.g., oil, water, magma) flowing through the tiny pores and cracks in the rocks that comprise the geological formations underground. But how can we predict the efficiency of oil production from a reservoir? How can we forecast how violent a volcanic eruption will be? Geological formations are large and heterogeneous – think of the iconic images of the Grand Canyon. Flow processes may last for hundreds to thousands of years, or even longer. Obviously, these are time and length scales that cannot be studied directly in the laboratory. Hence it is common to use computer simulations to mathematically model how fluids flow through rocks. This talk will illustrate how interdisciplinary research between mathematicians, engineers, and geologists can lead to exciting new insights into the flow processes in geological formations, using examples that range from the world’s largest oil reservoirs to exploding volcanoes.

 

Biography:

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Sebastian joined Heriot-Watt University in 2006 as a lecturer at the Institute of Petroleum Engineering (IPE). He was promoted to senior lecturer in 2009 and to full professor in 2010, becoming the world’s first chair in carbonate reservoir simulation and youngest ever professor at IPE. Before joining IPE, he was a postdoctoral researcher at ETH Zurich from 2004 to 2006. He obtained his PhD degree in computational geosciences from the same university in 2004. He holds an MSc degree and Vordiplom (equivalent to BSc degree) in geosciences from Oregon State University (2000) and University of Freiburg (1997), respectively. He was a visiting researcher at the Department of Earth Science and Engineering at Imperial College in 2006 and a visiting fellow at the Department of Mathematics at Australia National University in 2001.
Sebastian is an elected council member of the Interpore Society, a dedicated organisation promoting interdisciplinary research in natural and industrial porous media. He will co-convene the 2012 Hedberg Research Conference on Fundamental Controls of Flow in Carbonates in France, a premier research conference in the field. Sebastian is the PI on several industrially funded and multi-disciplinary research projects and frequently collaborates with researchers from world renowned international institutions, including ETH Zurich, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, or the US Geological Survey. He is one of the main developers of the Complex System Modelling Platform, a state-of-the-art simulator for modelling multi-physics processes in structurally complex porous media developed jointly by Heriot-Watt University, Montan University of Leoben, and ETH Zurich and sold commercially to the oil and gas industry.

 

Please email to register for this event HWU-Lectures@hw.ac.uk