CCUS/Geological Sequestration of CO2

Charles E. (Chuck) Fox, is the Founder and CEO of Windy Cove Energy, LLC, which invests in oil and gas projects. Previously he was the Vice President of Operations and Engineering for Kinder Morgan CO2 Company, where in addition to managing operations of the McElmo Dome CO2 source field and 1,000 miles of CO2 pipelines, he was responsible for the company’s oil and gas CO2 EOR operations, which included the 5-billion-barrel original oil-in-place (OOIP) Yates field, the 3-billion-barrel OOIP SACROC field, and the Snyder Gasoline Plant.  

Mr. Fox is a co-instructor of two popular SPE courses, ‘Practical Aspects of CO2 Flooding EOR’ and ‘Geological Sequestration of CO2’, and is one of the co-authors of the SPE Monograph Volume 22, ‘Practical Aspects of CO2 Flooding’, published in 2002, on which the ‘Practical Aspects of CO2 Flooding EOR’ course is based.  He was a SPE Distinguished Lecturer during 2012-2013, and, in this role, he lectured at the SPE chapters, around the world, on ‘Carbon Capture and Storage SWOT Analysis: What it will take to move forward’. He was also an instructor for several short-courses held at the annual CO2 conferences in Midland, Texas, which were sponsored by the University of Texas of the Permian Basin and SPE.  

Mr. Fox was Chairman of the Program Committee of the SPE/DOE Fourteenth Symposium on Improved Oil Recovery, held in Tulsa, Oklahoma, during April 2004. He holds a MS degree in Petroleum Engineering from Stanford University, and a BS degree in Mechanical Engineering from Rice University. He is a licensed Professional Engineer (P.E.) in Texas and New Mexico, and a long-standing member of SPE.  
 

S. M. (Sam) Avasthi, PE, PhD, is Chairman and CEO, and Director of Engineering,  EOR/IOR, and CCUS, at Avasthi & Associates, Inc., a worldwide energy consulting company headquartered in Houston, Texas ( www.AvasthiConsulting.com ). In addition to providing strategic direction and leadership to the company, that he founded in 1990 and that now provides full-service, multi-specialty, integrated consulting services to the worldwide oil & gas industry for onshore and offshore (shallow and deep water), conventional and unconventional/shale, oil, gas, gas-condensate/volatile oil, and heavy (and extra heavy) oil field evaluation, development, and optimization (to maximize oil & gas recovery and project profitability), as well as for improved oil recovery (IOR) / enhanced oil recovery (EOR), CO2 EOR, CCUS / CO2 geosequestration, carbon management, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and related projects, he is active in consulting and training in his areas of technical expertise. 

Dr. Sam Avasthi has over 50 years of worldwide oil & gas industry experience in petroleum engineering, reservoir engineering and simulation/modeling, CO2 EOR project design, evaluation and optimization; revitalizing mature oil fields, and related projects. He has been providing consulting services to the worldwide oil & gas industry since the early 1970s; and has been involved in conducting reservoir engineering and simulation studies of some of the major EOR/IOR projects.

Dr. Sam Avasthi has lectured extensively, around the world, on numerous topics in his areas of technical expertise. He is a co-instructor of several popular public training courses taught under the auspicious of the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE): ‘Practical Aspects of CO2 Flooding EOR’, ‘Geological Sequestration of CO2’, ‘Practical Aspects of Thermal EOR’, ‘Practical Aspects of Shale EOR’, ‘Optimizing Gas Fields using Integrated Asset Modeling (IAM), and Introduction to Optimizing Shale Gas and Tight Oil Fields’, ‘Practical Reservoir Surveillance and Management Techniques for EOR/IOR Projects’, ‘Practical Techniques for Screening Deepwater Offshore Oil and Gas Exploration Prospects’.

Dr. Sam Avasthi is an engineering alumnus of the Indian Institute of Technology (Indian School of Mines), Imperial College London, and Texas A&M University (where he earned a Ph.D. degree in Petroleum Engineering). He was a Research Fellow in Chemical Engineering at Rice University; and worked for several years in senior-level petroleum engineering and consulting positions with major integrated global energy and consulting companies before founding Avasthi & Associates, Inc. in 1990. He is a licensed Professional Engineer (P.E.) in Texas, a Legion of Honor member of SPE, and a Technical Editor for four SPE publications (SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering Journal, SPE Production & Operations Journal, SPE Journal, and Oil & Gas Facilities). He can be contacted by email ( Sam.Avasthi@AvasthiConsulting.com ), or at LinkedIn [ Dr. S. M. (Sam) Avasthi, P.E. 

J. M. (Jay) Avasthi, PhD, is President and COO, and Director of Geoservices (Geomechanics, Geosciences, and CO2 Geosequestration) and Unconventional / Shale Resources Evaluation, Development and Optimization, at Avasthi & Associates, Inc., a worldwide energy consulting company headquartered in Houston, Texas (www.AvasthiConsulting.com). In addition to managing the worldwide consulting and training services operations of the company, which he joined in 2003, he is active in consulting and training in his areas of technical expertise.
 
Dr. Jay Avasthi has over 40 years of worldwide oil & gas industry experience, including 24 years with Chevron Corporation in geomechanics, well stimulation, rock properties, wellbore stability, and sand production prediction research and supervision. His expertise includes acquisition, calibration and use of the in-situ stress data for oil & gas well construction and production, and for waterflood (IOR) and CO2 flood (EOR) project performance improvement; and solving fracturing stimulation, waste disposal through injection, wellbore stability, wellbore mechanics, and sand production prediction problems. 

Dr. Jay Avasthi has been actively involved in technological advancements in the areas of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing since 1990. He is the inventor/author of a United States patent (Number 4,977,961) on ‘Method to Create Parallel Vertical Fractures in Inclined Wellbores’. In addition, he has authored/ co-authored numerous technical publications in peer-reviewed SPE, and other technical, journals; has taught several short courses, and conducted several hands-on training workshops, in his areas of technical expertise, around the world. He is a co-instructor of four popular training courses taught under the auspicious of SPE: ‘Practical Aspects of CO2 Flooding EOR’, ‘Geological Sequestration of CO2’, ‘Optimizing Gas Fields using Integrated Asset Modeling (IAM), and Introduction to Optimizing Shale Gas and Tight Oil Fields’, and ‘Practical Aspects of Shale EOR’.

Dr. Jay Avasthi is an engineering and geosciences alumnus of the Indian Institute of Technology (Indian School of Mines), the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison (where he earned a Ph.D. degree in Mining Engineering, with specialization in Rock Mechanics). He worked in senior-level engineering, research and supervisory positions at Chevron Corporation for 24 years, before joining Avasthi & Associates, Inc. in 2003. He is a long-standing member of SPE, a Technical Editor for the SPE Reservoir Evaluation & Engineering Journal; and has served as the SPE Los Angeles Basin Section Director and Program Chairman. 
 

Darrell Davis is a seasoned EOR/IOR reservoir engineering and simulation/ dynamic modeling professional with extensive worldwide oil & gas industry experience working on CO2 EOR projects.  He has worked as a Principal  EOR/IOR Reservoir Engineering and Simulation/ Dynamic Modeling, and CO2 EOR Projects, Consultant at Avasthi & Associates, Inc. (A&A) since 2017 and provides consulting and training services in his areas of technical expertise.  

Mr. Davis has over 40 years of worldwide oil & gas industry experience, having worked with Getty Oil/ Texaco, Advanced Resources, Devon Energy, Shell Oil, and Denbury Resources.  For the past 28 years he has focused on EOR/IOR reservoir engineering and simulation/ dynamic modeling, and on CO2 EOR, projects.  His extensive international experience includes working in Kuwait, Angola, Indonesia, Oman and Malaysia.

Mr. Davis has been a key player in the design and implementation of two CO2 floods along the US Gulf Coast.  The Port Neches field CO2 project was conducted by Texaco during the 1990s when oil prices were low, therefore he worked with members of a US government agency to obtain $8.7 million funding from the US Department of Energy (DOE).  He also designed a pilot CO2 flood for an offshore oilfield in Vietnam, performing reservoir simulation while coordinating slim-tube tests, facilities design, and cost estimation.  He spent 3-1/2 years in Oman working for Shell on miscible gas floods of carbonate stringers. While with Denbury, he was the lead reservoir engineer on two successful CO2 floods.  He and co-workers prepared SPE paper #144961-PP, during 2011, that he presented at the SPE Enhanced Oil Recovery Conference in Malaysia. 

Mr. Davis is an alumnus of the University of Houston, where he earned a Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering. He is a co-instructor, with Dr. Sam Avasthi and Dr. Jay Avasthi, of three popular training courses taught under the auspicious of SPE: ‘Practical Aspects of CO2 Flooding EOR’, ‘Geological Sequestration of CO2’, and ‘Practical Aspects of Shale EOR’.